Reboot: Tomorrow Never Knows
by V'Kotik
Summary: Reboot of my "Words" universe without blowing up planet Vulcan. Please read the Foreword for detailed explanation. Reviews always welcome.,
1. Foreword

**Foreword**

This story was started in 2009 and describes the lives of our favorite star ship crew as it would develop in my idea of the Star Trek universe in the 22nd century. The motivation to write it came from several aspects of the TV series that were handled badly in my point of view. The whole universe was too dark and too dangerous for a start.

Of course nobody would have wanted for the series to end up as a space faring version of the Tele-Tubbies, but with Klingons, Xindi and Romulans there were enough super-villains available and it wouldn't have needed the atrocities that some characters were put through.

Trip and T'Pol were constantly handed the brown end of the stick and couldn't buy a break at all. They were thrown from one horror into the next. If you expect another story that makes Trip suffer at every corner, this tale will probably not be your kind of material. There is enough danger from working in Engineering that we don't need to have our favorite engineer abducted, impregnated, beaten or otherwise abused whenever he leaves the ship.

The time line starts after the final scene of the episode "Bound" and follows the lives of Enterprise's crew from late 2154 to some time after the founding of the Federation.

Some of you will recognize most of it as a rewrite of my story "Words". The reason for that is quite simple. That story was started five years ago, when my writing was a lot weaker than it is today. And unlike now I also published most of that without a beta reader. With its sequels it also became too experimental and I recently had to retire the second sequel due to overwhelmingly bad reception. So, instead of coming up with ever crazier ideas, I decided to revisit this universe again with five more years of experience with fanfiction writing. Unlike JJ Abrahams though, I won't reboot my universe by blowing up planet Vulcan.

You will still find that some people do not fit exactly the characterisation we saw on screen. In my stories this usually concerns Hoshi, who was very inconsistently written in the show and T'Pau will most likely be _very _different from the arrogant brat we got to see on TV.

As with all my latest stories there is a version on fanfiction dot net that is suitable for teens with knowledge about the birds and bees and a version for adults on ArchiveOfOurOwn

_The Fat Hippo, __Sep 4__th__ 2014_


	2. Midnight Confessions

1. Midnight Confessions

They were walking out of sickbay and T'Pol was trying to think of a way to start a conversation with the man walking beside her, but nothing really came to her mind. She was not well versed in talking about intimate aspects of her life, as this was usually not done on Vulcan. Ensign Sato, however, had made it clear that this was her last chance to win back the heart of the chief engineer. She had to act or he would return to _Columbia_ and all that remained would be disturbing and thoroughly dissatisfying encounters in the white nothingness of her mind in meditation.

"Guess we proved it again," she heard him say.

"Proved what?" T'Pol asked in reply, still thinking about how to direct the conversation to the urgent topic of his continued presence aboard _Enterprise _.

"That you and I make a helluva team," the engineer answered.

"We seem to work well together."

"Even more, now that we're in each other's head," he added nonchalantly, obviously oblivious to the importance of this development.

There was one little detail about the bond that T'Pol had not disclosed earlier. For him it was just a series of seemingly sporadic daydreams, which drew him into her white space, but for her the bond was a much stronger connection. Since humans had latent, weak telepathic abilities at best and even those existed in only in very few specimens, the bond in its early stages was almost a one-way connection.

About a week before she had noticed sporadically erupting emotions, which seemingly came out of nowhere. Soon she had observed that their occurrence matched exactly the pattern of Commander Tucker's behavior. Whenever he had an emotional outburst or made his trademark jokes, T'Pol felt his emotions as a resonance in her own mind whenever they were strong enough. This had led to the realization that there was a connection between them and their history left only one candidate – a mating bond.

It was soon time to explain to him the full ramifications of this fact, before he returned to Columbia. As she heard him talk about 'being in each other's head' – a typically crude human metaphor – she also noticed that he experienced a mix of positive emotions at the time, calming her fears that the subject of her desire would be afraid of the unusual connection.

"You're returning to _Columbia_?" she asked, carefully hiding her insecurity.

"I imagine Captain Hernandez is getting pretty antsy to have her Chief Engineer back."

She saw right through the statement, but was surprised and disconcerted that she picked up no trace of emotional response. He was either completely indifferent or kept his emotions in check, which she had not witnessed too often so far.

"There are still numerous repairs to be carried out here."

"I think Kelby can handle them." The engineer dismissed her sentiment, fueling her worries that he seemed intent to leave _Enterprise _. "He's been observing my work pretty carefully, when he wasn't trying to blow up the ship."

He still gave no indication of an emotional response and a suspicion formed in T'Pol's mind. He seemed to be doing what he had done so often – engaging in an argument to trick her into admitting something or telling him something in a way he wanted to hear it. A long time ago Ensign Sato had explained that this process was called 'teasing' and generally a sign of affection. Only humans would come up with a sign of affection that could become annoying. It was entirely possible, then, that he was using his arguments for his return to _Columbia_ as a ruse to inveigle her into asking him to stay.

When her female friend, the ship's communications officer, had explained about the custom of teasing, she had also mentioned that the humans often expected the 'favor to be returned'. That was why T'Pol had developed a certain competitiveness in their friendly banter. She was not willing to give him an easy win.

"Kelby is a fine engineer, but he lacks experience," she said and a short wave of annoyance washed through the bond, indicating that his emotional nature had got the better of him – proving her suspicion.

He stopped and she came to halt not too far from him. "Why don't you just say it?" Trip asked, visibly impatient.

"Say what?" She feigned ignorance and started to enjoy this when she saw his slight exasperation. Obviously, the Commander could not eat what he dished out – as Ensign Sato used to say – at least not today. It was not often that she won one of their arguments.

"That you want me to come back," he said and she could easily sense that he was disappointed she had not offered it on her own.

"I believe I did," the Vulcan answered with an innocently raised eyebrow. "I believe that your presence here would be extremely beneficial to our operations."

"No, that _you_ want me back," he demanded and annoyance now resonated through the bond very clearly and strongly.

"I don't know what you mean," she lied, and regretted it immediately. The mixture of hurt, anger and sadness almost drew a visible response from her and she knew instantly that she had gone too far. She might have gotten better at bantering, but she was still clumsy in her interactions with humans whenever she tried her hand at purely human ways of socializing. Again she had failed to stop before he was seriously displeased.

"My mistake. See you around," he sighed in visible disappointment. And turned to go,

The only logical conclusion was to deliver what he had wanted to hear; to undo the damage she had inadvertently done. "Wait, Trip," she called out, knowing that her use of his nickname would make him at least listen. As she had noticed a long time ago, this was the most effective method to get his full attention, since she so rarely did it.

"I want you to come back," she admitted. If she did not concede defeat now, in this small struggle, then it was all too clear that she would lose the entire war, as the human expression put it.

"Then I'll think about it," he answered and turned to go again.

'Thinking about it' still left a fifty per cent chance of the answer being 'No'. Suddenly that thought caused panic and fear of losing him again, and there was not much time to react; so she decided to convey the message in an unmistakable manner – she had to show him why she wanted him to come back.

"Trip!" she called after him with more urgency, then took the couple of steps necessary to catch up with him and kissed the surprised engineer passionately.

Nothing had prepared her for the onslaught of emotions that she picked up now that they were in intense contact. Getting faint transmissions through the bond was one thing; now, due to the Vulcan's inherent touch telepathy, it was a torrent of conflicting passions that caught her completely unprepared.

Love, desire and longing warred with sadness, hurt and anger with a most frightening intensity. But before she broke the kiss and struggled to regain her composure, she also noticed an undercurrent of mischief and satisfaction. Something was afoot.

He gently wiped his hand along his lips and smiled mischievously as he revealed the reason behind his satisfaction. "Three days ago, I told Captain Hernandez that I wanted a transfer back to _Enterprise _."

"Three days ago," T'Pol answered in barely suppressed indignation. He _had_ tricked her!

"I realized this is where I was meant to be, and this thing between us isn't that big a deal."

T'Pol could easily detect that he deliberately belittled the importance of their bond and the very unmistakable public admission of her desire. He wanted to provoke her into convincing him of the opposite. The ball was in her court, as Captain Archer had once told Ambassador Soval.

"Agreed." she replied, hiding that she had seen through his seemingly unconcerned reply.

"Guess we gotta lot of work to do," he remarked with an impertinent grin before disappearing around the corner.

T'Pol walked to her quarters with a still very elevated eyebrow. Finally she had admitted the existence of the bond to the ship's chief engineer and although the latest round of banter had resulted in a crushing defeat, she was relieved that she had Trip back. The thought of his permanent departure had unsettled her for the last two weeks and she was almost grateful for the Klingon augments' sabotage that had necessitated his return. Quickly she pushed that thought down – it was illogical and unseemly.

=/\=

With just minutes to go until midnight, Trip came home after a long day in engineering. Grimy, his uniform covered in scorch marks from exploding EPS conduits, he dragged his exhausted body into his cabin, making a bee line for the shower to get rid of the muck.

_I cannot believe she did that, _he thought while letting the hot water wash off the dirt and sweat of a long day. _Admitting that she wants me back was a big enough surprise, but planting a wet one on me – in a wide open corridor of all places! Dear __God l__et it be serious this time, I can't take another push and I can't even transfer away if it happens again. Not after the stunt with Columbia._

He had not had the time to process today's events, due to the carnage in engineering, but now the thoughts kept coming despite his fatigue. After cleaning himself, he went back to the main room in search of his sweatpants, but he was interrupted by the door chime. At this late an hour it could only be Jon with an invitation to one of the rare late-night live broadcasts of water polo. He quickly wrapped a towel around his waist. But – unexpectedly – it was not his friend who was making a house call in the middle of the night.

"Good evening. I may have come at an inconvenient time..." He saw T'Pol stop dead in her tracks when she saw his wardrobe situation.

"Don't worry." He dismissed her hesitation and waved her to come in. "It's not like you haven't seen everything before."

"Indeed," she agreed and noticed that he had put on considerable muscle mass since their first - and so far last - disrobed encounter.

"What brings you here and what's in that bag?" Trip asked casually, and then without any sign of shyness dropped the towel to put on his pants.

T'Pol distracted herself from the urge to look at his physique by picking up his uniform and other pieces of clothing that he had dropped where they fell on his way to the shower. Trip nearly chuckled at her compulsive need to restore order and neatness.

"Resulting from recent events and findings, I believe it to be necessary to discuss something with you. The purpose of the bag will be explained in the process," she explained, once Trip had put on his pants.

"I'm dead tired," he said. "But I think you're right, it's best to talk some things out."

Inviting her to do so as well, he sat down on the bunk and waited for what she had to say.

"Based on my actions of today, you have most likely come to the conclusion that my interest in your return to _Enterprise _is not entirely motivated by professional reasons." It didn't take a rocket scientist to see that she had carefully rehearsed this little speech. Deep in his heart he knew how difficult it was for a Vulcan to speak about her most intimate thoughts.

"Unless you've developed a habit of motivating people with smooches," he joked with a smile.

She did not show much of a reaction to his quip, but he could see she had to stop her brow from climbing up on her features. "There are a number of reasons that prompted my actions and I wish to confess my motives. This will take a considerable amount of time, and therefore I shall not be offended if you ask me to defer it until you have had sufficient rest."

"Don't worry about my rest, T'Pol," Trip said dismissively and shook his head. "I've waited almost two years for you to finally tell me what the hell is going on between us - or not, for that matter. I'll stay awake even if it takes a week."

"Very well." She acquiesced with a nod and continued her narration. "Do you remember what happened when I was exposed to Trellium-D on the _Seleya_?"

"Sure as hell do. You completely lost it, and ever since then you've had the occasional emotional outburst. In fact, for quite a while I was afraid it had left some permanent damage."

"You are most perceptive. In fact it has left damage, but not in the way you would expect," she explained, and he felt a clenching sensation in his stomach. Was she ill?

"Is it bad?" he asked, and couldn't quite keep his worries from showing in his voice.

"Please hear the complete explanation," she continued and Trip nodded. "When the aftereffects of my Trellium-D exposure started to subside and only a mild influence was still left, I noticed that I could experience certain emotions, even though they are usually instinctively suppressed. Those were fascination, amusement, but also fear and anger."

His bad feeling got even worse, but he decided to refrain from interrupting. He knew the Vulcan well enough to see that she was talking about some things that weighed heavily on her.

"I wanted more of those emotions. I noticed that I fared better in my interactions with the crew – especially with you – and I hoped to become able to reciprocate the outward signs of affection that you displayed. So I began injecting micro-doses of Trellium-D into my bloodstream, which allowed me to access emotions at any time. Unfortunately I had not considered the possibility of becoming addicted."

Trip buried his face in his palms and sighed heavily. He couldn't believe she had been stupid enough to drug herself. When he looked back up, he saw that T'Pol had what must be the Vulcan equivalent of the deer-in-headlights look. Her shame and the fear of him sending her away were palpable.

"Do you still do it?" he asked, as calmly as he could in his shocked state.

"No," she answered, her eyes now downcast in obvious shame. "After I was almost killed during an attempt to reach the Trellium-D storage in the cargo bay on the damaged ship, I went to Dr. Phlox and sought medical help to overcome the addiction. The therapy was successful, but my ill-advised actions have caused permanent damage to my neuro-pathways."

He buried his face in his palms again. She was the _science_ _officer_, for crying out loud. How could she do something so monumentally stupid? A spike of anger mixed into his disbelief.

"You messed up your own body to get close to me?" he asked in sheer bewilderment. "Hell, we were closer than any other two people on the ship! At least, that's what I thought. Way before the _Seleya,_ you had become my best friend after Jon secluded himself from everyone."

"I think we both know that it wasn't a 'best friend' we were hoping to be," she said softly.

"_We_?" Trip's eyes went wide, his anger getting the better of him. "T'Pol, you kept pushing me away again and again. Hell, you even married that guy Koss! I know it was for your mother, but you never thought it was necessary to tell me that he released you from that mockery of a marriage. I learned about that from Jon. I don't get it, why did you shut me out if you wanted the same as I did? Why did you lie to me?"

Trip regretted his little outburst almost immediately when he was confronted by a sight that was new to him – her tears. She wasn't all-out bawling, but two silent tears running down the face of a Vulcan were an unsettling enough picture.

"Sorry," he whispered, ashamed of his impulsive reaction. He carefully moved his hand to her face and cupped her cheek. To his surprise she snuggled into his gentle touch.

"You have every right to be displeased," she replied in a small voice. "As I explained earlier, I did not only experience favorable emotions. Due to the damage that I had inflicted, I was no longer able to suppress all emotions instinctively. I was unable to deal with them. I was confused and scared. Those unsettling emotions and my inability to make sense of them were the driving forces behind the many wrong decisions I made in connection with you. I was afraid of losing control and damaging you. "

"You would never hurt me," he claimed with conviction. The picture of the woman who was now plainly enjoying the touch of his hand, trying to hurt him physically did not fit together in his mind.

"What changed?" he asked, edging closer to her. "Looks to me like you finally smelled the cordite and decided to 'fess up."

T'Pol, momentarily confused by his strange metaphor (after all, cordite was known to have no smell), continued her explanation. "The first important event was when I spoke to my counterpart on the _Enterprise_ from the other time line."

"W-wait-a-minute," he stammered in surprise. "You talked to... _yourself?_ Why didn't you or Lorian tell me that you …she ...the other you was still alive?"

"She asked the Captain not to tell you. My older self was afraid of seeing you again and then losing you a second time."

Trip gulped and – a very rare event – was speechless at the raw emotion emanating through her voice. He continued to listen to her recollection.

"She explained to me that you were the key to mastering those emotions. When I was prepared to make the final step, we were on Vulcan, but I spare you the pain of reminding you in detail of the events. You were there."

"Roger that," Trip sighed.

"The grief from the death of my mother, and the shame of having caused you so much pain and suffering by marrying Koss, prevented me from getting closer to you after he released me. I was too ashamed of my actions. Once you left for _Colum__bia_, however, I realized that the pain of losing your constant presence and losing the chance to be with you was infinitely less bearable than any shame, fear or confusion."

"So you finally decided that it'd be better to talk to me rather than watching me jump ship again," he concluded, just to make sure he understood her motives properly.

"This conclusion is warranted. Until now I tried to deny my affection and my wish to be close to you for mostly wrong reasons. I decided that it is not practicable to continue that self-deception, as it is completely without logic."

"Did you just say what I think you did?" he asked, an insecure smile appearing on his features.

She looked him in the eyes. "Trip..., I know human customs would now demand the sentence 'I love you' to be spoken, but I cannot speak about something that I do not yet entirely understand. What I do understand is that I have a deep affection for you, an affection I've never had for anyone else. Imagining my life without you is beyond my mental capabil..."

She was cut short by a hot, passionate kiss that she returned eagerly. Now, in close intimate contact with him once again, she could feel the overpowering relief and joy reverberating in his mind.

"You know what? You just translated 'I love you' from human to Vulcan and God be my witness, I love you, too," he declared.

Both embraced each other and for a long time they didn't say a word, quietly relaxing in each other's closeness and ridding themselves of the sadness caused by months of rejection and unrequited longing.

"So what about that bag 'o yours?" he asked after the long break, still holding her close to him. Her head was resting on his chest.

"It contains clothing and items of personal hygiene for the case that you would allow me to spend the night with you," she explained, looking up into his eyes with a hint of uncertainty.

"Wow, you're upping the pace quite a bit," Trip remarked with a grin for the ages.

"If it inconveniences you..."

"Are you kidding me? I've been dreaming about falling asleep with you in my arms ever since we..., well for a long time already."

"In this case I shall be honored to make your dream a reality," T'Pol promised as he released her from his embrace.

"After all this time, I cannot tell you how happy I am," he sighed and a his eyes started to moisten as he realized that a very long wait was coming to an end.

"You don't need to tell me, I share your emotions," she said softly and wiped the errant tear off his face.

"Ah right, you're in my head now," he chuckled.

"That is the second topic we need to discuss, but beforehand I shall prepare for the night."

When T'Pol disappeared into the bathroom, Trip let out a happy sigh. Finally she had given up her reluctance to admit the obvious. Inwardly he marveled at her straight approach. Usually she would have danced around the topic or drowned it in Vulcanese stilt speak – not tonight. It was less than a day from learning about the bond to the first night spent together in one bunk – incredible. But he couldn't shake the almost instinctual worry that she might back-pedal again in the morning. After all, it wouldn't be the first time.

=/\=

He was still sitting on the bunk when T'Pol returned from the bathroom and when he caught sight of her? he forgot to breathe. She wore white panties - definitely not of Vulcan origin – and nothing else. The sight of his Vulcan dream girl in nothing but skimpy panties blew up a couple more conduits, this time in his head rather than engineering. Almost on auto-pilot he reached over and raised the room's temperature using the environmental controls panel.

"Congruency," she remarked dryly and pointed at his bare chest when he still continued staring at her voluptuous breasts. Since their tissue was designed to withstand Vulcan's high gravity, they were unusually firm for their size.

"There's something to be said for being in love with the Science Officer," he muttered, still rather absent-minded, and not giving a hoot about the fact that he was probably staring at her like an idiot. After all, she wouldn't have come back half-naked if she didn't want to be looked at.

They had just lain down when the door chime announced another late-night visitor. Trip jumped out of bed, throwing her one of his T-shirts to cover her upper half. T'Pol shoved her legs under the blanket. Parading herself in skimpy panties for anyone but him was evidently not an option. He joined her on the bunk again.

"You okay with this?" he whispered, pointing at the door when the chime rang a second time.

"It is less undignified to be... caught like this, rather than being discovered by a biosign scan, which will most likely happen if we ignore hails," she decided. "The crew will notice, one way or the other, as I do not plan to hide our relationship."

Nodding, Trip announced his permission to enter and the door revealed the visitor to be Captain Archer, who stopped dead in his tracks.

"I know those pheromones have side effects and will take time to wear off, but I thought you two were immune?" he wondered wide-eyed.

"We are, Cap'n," Trip replied neutrally.

"Hmm, I could swear I see my First officer and my Chief Engineer, both in one of his shirts, and sitting on and in his bunk, respectively. When did this happen?"

"Well, thirty minutes ago and pheromones had nothing to do with it. Don't take it the wrong way, Cap'n. Unless the ship's blowing up... I think T'Pol's a bit uneasy with the situation. So, if you wouldn't mind... I promise I'll answer any question you might have about everything. Just not right now."

"Okay, okay, Trip, I'll get lost," Archer said with a smile and excused himself, wishing them a good night. Obviously seeing that Trip had a somewhat more attractive option at hand than watching a late-night water-polo broadcast, he left them alone.

"Well, looks like we're doing this top-down," Trip sighed after the door closed behind the Captain.

"I had the distinct impression that you preferred 'top off'," T'Pol replied deadpan and got rid of the T-shirt again.

"Cap'n was right, some of my sense of humor is definitely rubbing off on you," Trip laughed and crawled back under the sheets with her. Gently cupping one of her breasts, he asked her to explain the second topic she wanted to talk about.

=/\=

She indicated that he should lie down and lay on her back beside him to give him better access to her bust. "I wish to speak with you about the bond. It is imperative that you have sufficient information to make your decision."

"Okay..." he said and T'Pol carefully observed his face. In terms of logic this was not an ideal time for such a discussion, but he seemed to be paying appropriate attention to her words, not only her body. She had longed for his touch too long to stop him now and due to their different biology, it would probably be herself anyway, who lost concentration first.

"The decision to bond is a decision for a lifetime. On Vulcan, being bonded amounts to what Earth considers a legal marriage. Unlike on Earth, however, the option of a divorce is not available."

"So you mean to say we're married?" he asked, letting go of her soft tissue. T'Pol could see that this latest information grabbed his full attention and with satisfaction she noticed that he decided to concentrate on what she said instead of distracting himself by exploring her physique.

"I haven't completed my explanation yet," she replied and gently grabbed his wrist to direct his hand back to where she wanted it to be. "Our bond is still in its infancy. To make it easier for you to understand, you could compare it with the human custom of becoming engaged. With time, due to intimate contact and consummation of the physical side of the relationship, it strengthens and becomes increasingly harder to break. Once the bond is completed, it cannot be severed without putting both mates in terminal danger."

"So if I get that right... We're engaged and whenever we touch or when we consummate... what _precisely _does that mean?" She suspected he knew, but in a case as important as this it was vital to get his facts exactly right.

"It means that we mate," she replied dryly and she heard that her voice had become a little raspy from his gentle ministrations to her mammary features. She doubted that he had any idea how arousing it was to have her bust stimulated the way he was now doing. She could feel how her vision deteriorated, a clear sign of her reaching a state of arousal that made sexual relief almost imperative.

Trip groaned, this time from frustration as much as desire?. "We don't... mate! Do me a favor please, don't use that word. We use that term when animals do the deed and we're no animals. So, whenever we make love the bond gets stronger and once it's strong enough you'll be my wife and we'd die if we tried to divorce, right?"

"In essence, yes," she said, her voice quivering in desire. She searched for his other hand and gently put it on her chest too.

"Great!" he beamed. "If I weren't so damn tired, I'd probably start right away, so we'd be undivorceably married by the morning. But seriously, T'Pol, did you really think that I would want to break that bond? Forget it!"

"I'm gratified to hear that. I do admit that I was afraid that you would consider severing the bond," she said and when she saw his shocked face, added, "for approximately one point two-five seconds," sending him into a fit of laughter while her senses started to diminish further.

"You are something else," he said.

=/\=

T'Pol's hand roamed his upper body, trying to find the sparse layer of hair on his torso. The vicious climax after their coupling and the immediate build-up to it had temporarily disabled her vision and hearing and it would take several minutes to recover the use of those senses. This temporary helplessness was just one of many reasons why most of her fellow Vulcans forewent sexual relations unless forced to do so by the blood fever. Having experienced the passion of a devoted human mate, she would willingly endure an even longer period of partial disability in exchange for the unspeakably intense pleasure this 'making love' brought to her mind and body. Once she had found the light fur with her sensitive fingertips she rolled him gently off her on to his back and rested her head on his muscular chest.

For the second time in her life she experienced the surreal situation of her mind being ravaged by a torrent of pleasurable emotions without any audible or visual input. Usually such a vulnerable state would alarm her, but being held in his strong arms gave her a feeling of security. Her finger gently glided over his lips to find out if he was speaking, but she sensed no movement. He obviously remembered that she would not be able to hear him for several minutes to come. She could feel the light kiss he planted on her digit.

Satisfied by her human mate's reassuring embrace, she slowly drifted off to sleep after he had covered their unclothed bodies with the blanket.


	3. Winds Of Change

Winds of Change

Trip woke up feeling a light pressure on his chest. A short spike of alarm made his eyes fly open, but then he remembered that said pressure was caused by a rather beautiful naked Vulcan using him as a pillow. That was a sort of pressure he could definitely get used to.

When he looked down his glance was met by two hazel-colored orbs looking back at him and although he wasn't sure if it was just his imagination, he thought that she looked rather content, if not even happy – as much as that was possible for a Vulcan.

"Mornin' darling," he whispered and to his surprise she answered his greeting with a kiss. For someone who had stubbornly maintained for such a long time that he was foolish in his desire to have a relationship with her, this was quite a transformation. Last night had literally changed everything.

"You okay?" he asked, wondering if her surprising reaction might be one of those instances of her doing the most unexpected things to conceal a weakness or a problem. "Your eyes and ears have recovered?"

"I already explained to you after our first encounter that this reaction is an unfortunate aspect of my biology, but it does not leave any lasting damage."

He started chuckling softly and seeing her inquiringly raised eyebrow, he explained the reason for his amusement.

"We have a saying: 'Love makes you blind'," he remarked. "I'd say you Vulcans take that concept quite literally."

"The effects of sexual relief are very individual. Not everyone loses vision," she explained. "My mother did extensive studies on the subject before V'Las ascended to power. She found out that almost every Vulcan female shows a different reaction. While some do suffer almost no sensory impairments there are others who even experience temporary paralysis."

"Your mother did studies on the effect of orgasms on the Vulcan senses?" he asked with a lopsided grin. For a race that considered telling one's age an intimate act, such a topic of study appeared to be a rather outlandish idea.

"We would never make such intimate studies public," T'Pol continued with a touch of severity. "My mother's data are only accessible to a select few scientists. Even if she wasn't giving off the impression during our visit, my mother was intensely curious and much more liberal in her younger years. I believe my father was never deprived of intimate activity."

"So this whole 'once every seven years' thing is basically just a nice little fairy tale, I guess," he stated with amusement.

"Not entirely," the woman in his arms contradicted. "As you have witnessed, Vulcans are quite capable of engaging in sexual relations whenever they wish, but most choose not to do so, because they fear the debilitating effects of prolonged arousal even though they are of transitory nature."

"Talk about a show stopper," he said pensively. "Are you afraid in those few minutes before and after you... you know...?"

"Not when you hold me during that time," she admitted. "I actually find your protective embrace during my temporary helplessness a rather pleasurable experience."

Her head bounced slightly up and down on his chest as he chuckled softly at her admission.

=/\=

"I did not know that you were so conservation-conscious," T'Pol stated, her eyebrow raised in amusement as he toweled her back dry after their first-ever joint morning shower. "Your idea to conserve water is most logical."

"See, I'm a veritable fountain of logical ideas," she heard his humorous reply, letting him continue to towel areas of her physique that she could have easily reached herself. It didn't need a bond to notice that he found any reason to admire her appearance and to touch her, a most welcome experience. There was no logic in denying him that pleasure as long as he didn't cause too much arousal. To a degree she could avoid that by applying mental techniques.

"I would not go that far," she replied dryly, turning around and giving him access to rub the front of her body dry. "I notice a direct proportionality between the quality of your logic and the desirability of a resulting outcome."

She relished the sound of his laughter.

=/\=

"For someone who has to clean up that mess outside, you're in an awfully good mood." He heard a female voice from behind and knew immediately that it was Anna Hess. Nobody other than his spunky, red-haired second in command or perhaps Malcolm would ever have the audacity to walk into his office in engineering unannounced and invite herself to sit next to him.

He had known the red-haired she-devil since the academy. She had just joined STC while he was in his final year. The southerner had seen immediately that she was a brilliant engineer. The fact that her hover car was more powerful and maneuverable than the vehicle's manufacturer had ever intended it to be had made that pretty obvious at the time. On top of being a brilliant engineer, whom he would hand the keys to engineering any time and without a second thought, she was like no other woman he'd known before.

She had somehow managed something that every woman would dream of: she had assembled all her body fat in a place where the ladies would actually want it to be. Without knowing every female on board, he was quite sure that she was the only one even bustier than T'Pol and she was definitely not shy to flaunt it. Anna had absolutely no qualms of using the communal shower in engineering, even if men were using it too at the time, so just about everybody in engineering had at some time gotten a good look at her muscular body, as was evidenced by the fact that nobody dared to talk back to her. She could knock anyone on his ass.

"Hey there, chief?" she asked. "You zoned out on me. Care to tell me what that goofy grin is all about? Don't tell me that a certain bridge officer has finally gotten her stuff together and forked you to the plate."

His grin got even wider.

"You shouldn't talk like that about a superior officer," he replied with not entirely convincing sternness. "I let you get away with a lot of stunts, because you still get the job done and run a tight control over the team. But don't count on the Captain or Commander T'Pol being that laid back about things."

"That doesn't answer my question, chief. Did she or did she not?" She refused to let the topic go.

He just nodded.

"Well, finally," she said with a grin and gave him a congratulatory pat on the back.

"That means you can't walk in on me in the shower anymore," he warned her. "Trust me, you'd be in a hell of a lot of trouble."

"I know," she acknowledged, still grinning. "Amanda told me that Commander T'Pol can be quite unsubtle in letting you know that she wants you to keep your hands off a certain engineer."

"What the hell's that supposed to mean?" he asked, slightly irritated.

"Shouldn't you be on your way to the captain's mess?" she asked, evading the answer.

"Dammit," he swore and ran out of engineering.

=/\=

Jon fought the urge to chuckle when he noticed Trip's obvious nervousness. The younger man had just bolted in after running all the way from engineering if his heavy breathing was anything to go by. Knowing what the topic of the conversation was bound to be, his once best friend began fidgeting almost as soon as he'd settled himself down.

The captain didn't feel like taking Trip out of his misery yet. It was too funny seeing him squirm. He waited patiently until the steward had laid out the plates, cutlery and glasses and departed, and then indicated that they should start the meal

"So, Trip," he opened the conversation eventually, taking pity on his hapless 'guest'. "Was that a one-time occurrence or do I need to call T'Pol's quarters whenever I need information from my chief engineer after duty?"

There wasn't an immediate answer and Jon could see that the younger officer tried to buy himself some time by chewing his bite of meat very thoroughly.

"That depends on who I'm talking to," the engineer answered after a while. "Am I talking to Jon or to Captain Jonathan Archer?"

"Both would be equally happy for you both of you, Trip," the captain said and raised his glass of beer.

"But I doubt Starfleet shares that particular sentiment," his companion replied and Jon could see a mixture of sadness and anger on the man's face.

"That's why I asked you to have this talk. Strictly speaking the no-fraternization regulations are still in place."

"And strictly speaking they're gonna court-martial the shit out of us," Trip spat angrily, throwing his fork down and spilling some of his beer. "But you know what? I don't give a damn. Bring on those fuddy-duddies. Let them try to take the woman I love away from me. They'll never know what hit 'em!"

"Trip!" Jon called out softly before the angered engineer could spill more of his beer. The engineer's sudden mood swing was slightly worrying. "I said _strictly speaking_. In reality, even the top brass have realized that you can't send out ships on missions that last years with those rules in place. I have the authority to exempt people from those restrictions _if_ it doesn't influence their professional conduct. So unless I find you and T'Pol doing the nasty on top of the warp reactor, I have no reason to prevent you from living in a committed relationship, and we both know that T'Pol is the best at keeping you in line."

Jon saw the emotions play like a movie on his friend's face. Trip was trying not to whoop and cheer, so much was obvious. But his commanding officer could also see that the ship's resident miracle worker was extremely? tired. His frequent and sudden mood changes were the tell-tale signs of him reaching the end of his rope as far as coping with his situation went. This was a man who desperately needed a time-out.

Considering that just a few months ago T'Pol had married another guy, it wasn't too hard to see that the ship's chief had never gotten any emotional quiet, even after the Xindi mission. T'Pol had not been too generous with details about what that Vucan shotgun wedding was all about, but the fact that it was annulled a mere three months later made it clear that it wasn't exactly a 'dream wedding'.

He knew Trip all too well. He had called T'Pol 'the woman I love', which meant it wasn't a recent development. Trip could have any woman he wanted – at least the shallow ones, as he was provided for by nature like a gas pump. But his friend never fell in love easily. If he used the L-word things were definitely very serious.

Now the pieces of the puzzle started to fall into place. Trip's departure had never had anything to do with any 'failings' on the job. He had been desperate enough to abandon the engine he had taken care of for four years. He had run from T'Pol. And it would also explain why she started to quote him umpteen times each day once he was gone.

Jon fought down a flash of furious regret. He had only had two real friendships in his life – with A.G. and with Trip. A.G. was dead, but the loss of the once-close friendship with Trip was something he could only blame on himself. Even if he couldn't repair that, however, what he could do was try to prevent Trip from running himself ragged. The younger man must have gone through an emotional roller-coaster ever since the end of the Xindi mission and Jon decided that, rules be hanged, there was only one thing to do now – his third and second in command needed some time alone and very far from any work.

He remembered something.

=/\=

Hoshi entered the ready room after having been summoned by her commanding officer. Considering that three bright green bitches had almost handed the ship to a bunch of equally green pirates the day before, his good mood appeared to her quite grossly misplaced. Only her strongest effort to restrain herself had prevented her from slapping the raw stuffing out of Malcolm for paying entirely too much attention to that green whore, she swore in her mind, realizing that the after-effects of the pheromones and the resulting bouts of seething jealousy were not yet completely out of her system.

"Captain," she saluted, trying not to betray the rather ripe mental conversation she was having with herself.

"Hoshi, I need you to do two of our officers a favor," he hinted nebulously. "As the ship's communication officer, I suppose you are also aware of body language?"

"Err, Y-yes sir," she replied hesitantly, not quite knowing where this was going.

"Specifically I'm talking about the body language of our science officer and the chief engineer," her commanding officer explained with an understanding smile.

"She did it!" Hoshi squealed, jumping up in joy, but then she remembered who she was talking to and clutched her mouth. "Oops..."

Her worries faded when she heard the captain's chuckle. "Rest assured that you didn't give away any secrets, Ensign," he said reassuringly. "I didn't exactly walk in on anything unprintable, but, let's say it was obvious they weren't reviewing duty rosters."

"I'm sorry, Sir," she said, when her eyes got slightly moist as the suspense fell away. She had known that if T'Pol would not take that last chance to get Trip back, both would probably soon be off the ship – Trip back to _Columbia_ and T'Pol would have probably headed back to Vulcan.

"You've been rooting for them for quite a while, haven't you?" he remarked.

"I think even Porthos knew," Hoshi replied with a giggle. "But the two of them were too dense to see the forest for all the trees. It was so obvious they were in love with each other. I'm sorry, I shouldn't be talking like that about superior officers."

Instead of agreeing with that statement, the captain laughed out loud.

"That's quite all right, Ensign," he said with a smile. "You can make up for that 'faux pas'. I want you to convince Crewman Fuller and her room-mate to give up their quarters and relocate into what until now was Commander Tucker's residence. That shouldn't be too hard, considering they'd gain an additional 20 square meters of living space."

"I suppose after that you want me to ask Lieutenant Hess to knock out a bulkhead?" she speculated with a bright smile as she got the idea of what the captain had in mind.

"Preferably without either Trip or T'Pol noticing anything," he added.

"How do you plan to get them off the ship?" the linguist asked. "I don't know if you realize just how sensitive Commander T'Pol's hearing is. Her quarters are not too far from the bridge. She'd be bound to hear it if we went to town in her quarters with heavy equipment."

"That will be your third task," the captain explained and she saw a mischievous smile cross his features. "Do you remember that M class planet we passed two days before we ran into the Orions?"

"The one with the long-legged rats," the linguist acknowledged slightly wistfully. In the early days of their mission they would never have passed by a planet that lush and beautiful without paying a visit. But that wide-eyed enthusiasm had long since been replaced by scientific pragmatism, and the world that would easily make a good holiday planet had just not provided anything of sufficient scientific interest to warrant the time and effort of sending down an away team.

"Make a stop at hydroponics and make sure that Larson, upon reviewing the data of our scans, realizes that we shouldn't have dismissed the flora of that planet as uninteresting quite so quickly and reports as much to me."

"Brilliant, sir," Hoshi beamed.

"Well, in a way it's not even that much of a ruse," her superior officer reasoned. "Chef reported that a stasis unit has packed in and we lost quite a lot of our fresh vegetables and fruits."

"I'm on my way," Hoshi said and bounded out, not even realizing that she had forgotten to wait until she was formally dismissed.

She couldn't see the smiling captain shaking his head, amused about her enthusiasm.

=/\=

_Two days later..._

Trip tried not to whistle when he set the shuttle down on a green meadow. This planet looked like something straight out of a holiday catalog. The whole valley was surrounded by high, snow-covered mountains, which provided a stark contrast to the warm climate of the area they enclosed. The eclectic mix of thousands of birds chirping filled the air as he helped Larson and Chef unpack their luggage. They were scheduled to remain for thirty hours, so both Larson and the rotund keeper of the galley had brought a tent, several mobile stasis containers, power cells to run the cooling aggregates of the containers and several scanners to verify the edibility of different fruits, vegetables and mushrooms.

"Want us to look out for something as well?" he asked Chef.

"What part of 'shore leave' do you need to have explained to you?" The cook waved him off gruffly. As the only civilian beside Phlox, the bulky priest of the food temple had no problems with giving even Jon a piece of his mind.

"Okay, okay," the engineer relented, pointing vaguely south. "If you need something, T'Pol and I will be about five thousand kilometers this way."

=/\=

Coming home after his duty shift ensign Masaro locked the door of his quarters and carefully checked the little indicators he had left to make sure that nobody had entered his quarters in his absence. The tiny, almost invisible, glass needle that would inevitably have been knocked over had someone opened his locker was still standing where he had placed it, leaning against the wardrobe door.

He took the little device hidden under a pile of shirts and placed it on his desk, before grabbing a set of modified interface cables from under a different pile of clothing. He sat down at his desk, plugging the cables into his makeshift controller.

When his console had finished booting up and the indicator showed that the rootkit had done its job and given him administrator privileges, he called up the debugging console and entered the short command sequence that deactivated the interface and transmission logging.

With a short cacophony of hums and beeps his controller module initialized after he had connected it to the auxiliary port of his console and the first images of his drone came in. Hiding a wasp-sized drone in an inlet manifold hadn't been that difficult. Nobody would check them as they only opened automatically during the landing, and even if they wouldn't open the shuttle would still land safely. Even in the case of something going wrong, nobody would notice; as shuttle maintenance was his job, it would be ridiculously easy to retrieve the device without anyone noticing.

He turned on the device's bio-sensor. Its range was extremely limited, but it would be enough to find out if any on the shuttle's inhabitants were nearby. Once the little drone was airborne not even the Vulcan and her freakishly good hearing would be able to tell it from a small insect.

After ensuring that nobody was within 10 meters of the craft, he directed the tiny device out of the manifold and let it gain altitude as quickly as the two micro-rotors and the miniature engine allowed it to. Hovering about 15 meters above the ground, the little motor should no longer be audible even to the Vulcan.

Masaro gasped when said Vulcan came into visual range of the miniature camera on the underside of the drone. The pointy-eared bitch was sitting in a lotus position on the widest, most pristine beach he'd ever seen. That was just great. While _they_ had to stay up on the ship, running each and every system maintenance available, the Chief and his Vulcan mistress spent a day in a tropical paradise. You'd have to bankrupt yourself to book a place like that on Earth. He zoomed in until the Vulcan filled the entire picture. She was sitting ramrod straight, eyes closed and she was completely and utterly naked!

=/\=

Jonathan Archer walked onto the building site. Engineering crewmen were carrying bits and pieces out of and into the two – now joined – quarters that would become the new residence of his first officer and chief engineer.

It had surprised him just how much positive feedback had reached him, now that the message about his two officers had spread around the ship. It looked as if quite a lot of people had secretly been hoping that the resident Vulcan and the dashing chief engineer would become an item. Well, if those two were to become a symbol of hope for the ship's crew – something good that had resulted from the terrible atrocities this ship and its crew had had to endure – it was only right to pull out all the stops.

When he entered the now quite spacious room, he could see that even some non-engineering personnel had volunteered to help. Larson from hydroponics for instance was placing a large pot containing an equally large _Ficus__—_an Indian rubber tree—into one of the corners, where a crewman from engineering fastened the pot to the floor. The quartermaster and engineering had outdone themselves, producing a large dinner table and a king-sized bed from finest wood that they had harvested on the other side of the planet, where Trip and T'Pol couldn't see the approaching shuttle.

His eyes fell on the woman in charge of the job. Four years ago he would definitely have had something to say about Lieutenant Hess' dress and conduct. Her uniform's zipper was parked about only half way up to where it was supposed to be, revealing quite a copious amount of cleavage – obviously pleasing the male contingent and some of the females too. The red-haired heir to Trip's throne in engineering was known to invite members of both genders into her bed. Not that it was any of his business, but this little fact was a prominent part of the ship's rumor mill, which he had discretely listened in to to get back in touch with what happened among the crew. It had been the fastest way to do so after he had gotten so disconnected from them in the Expanse. And it was only one of the surprising things he had learned about her.

With her dress code violation alone she ran roughshod over a lot of regulations. Add to that the 'crew morale' stunt she had pulled half a year ago by posing naked for a photo-shoot. After the pictures had been printed by the quartermaster's office, they were now adorning lockers of male and some of the female crew all over the ship. One would think a social butterfly like the muscular Bostonian of German descent would make lousy officer material, but in fact, despite being on display as a naked pin-up in many an engineer's private space, she ran the team like a well-oiled machine and everybody paid her the utmost respect.

Professional conduct in engineering had never been a reason for worry, except that both Trip and his second in command never were ones to ride the rule-book. Enforcing the dress code in engineering was a useless endeavor at the best of times, so they had never done it, except for areas that were immediately visible from the entrance to the engine room. If crewmen did maintenance work in a hot Jeffries tube and thought it was less unbearable doing so with their chest bared – all power to them, even if they were female. It was little wonder that Engineering had never any trouble finding volunteers if they needed reinforcements from the Armory for instance.

Despite this rather lax approach to 'law and order' in engineering, they had given him the fewest head-aches, closely followed by the Armory. There had been more cases of brawls between crewmen in science than there had been among Trip's crowd, even while under the influence of the Orion women. Trip and Hess gave their troops a lot more leash than regulations intended, but they had their undisputed loyalty in return and the results spoke for themselves. There simply wasn't a job that the engineering crew wouldn't get done. Like this one, for instance.

"How's the work going?" Jon asked when Hess came walking toward him. He let out a barely audible sigh of relief when she discreetly closed her zipper all the way up. It spared him fighting the momentary and unseemly fascination with what had been barely hidden moments before.

"We're behind the schedule slightly," she reported. "We had to install an additional support beam for the ceiling after knocking over the bulkhead, but we'll be finished in time."

"It's still almost twenty hours," he said encouragingly.

"And about 20 more hours' worth of work," she said, pulling the zipper down again, leaving him to shake his head with a grin as she turned away to rejoin her construction crew.

=/\=

One thing was for sure, Mr. Paxton would definitely like the recordings. A stark naked Vulcan enticing an equally naked human Engineer on a vacation to a tropical paradise. That was all it took to prove that the alien bitch was trying to control him. Why else would she have unpacked that hot body of hers? Now all he needed to do was getting the data back to the Orpheus Mining Facility and receive new instructions.

Washing his hands after the dirty deed of masturbating over the illicit recording of a superior officer, he threw the stained towel into the laundry chute and ended the recording.

There was no doubt that the Vulcan bitch had brainwashed the ship's chief engineer. Who would prefer an emotionless alien with freakishly bronze-colored nipples over a hot body like Anna's? Everybody knew that she had taken at least ten different guys to bed and quite a few women, too, but the one she _really _wanted – hell that one was down there skinny-dipping and getting laid by the pointy-eared whore.

He downloaded the recording into his private folder, encrypted it and took down his installation. After carefully stowing it away again, he started to write the private transmission to his buddy Ted in the Orpheus mining facility.

=/\=

T'Pol was breathing heavily, waiting for her blacked-out senses to recover. She had done everything she thought possible to create the most complete contentment in her mate. Meditating without clothing was not her usual practice, yet even if their bond was still immature she had felt his appreciation of her appearance when they had disrobed to take a bath in the sea. Her foray into the water had been very short lived since she could not swim and while the air temperature was quite acceptable, the water was way too cold for a Vulcan. Her mate had thoroughly enjoyed the bath though.

Later during the afternoon he had spent approximately ten minutes just quietly observing her physique. Uncharacteristically for him, he even had foregone offering verbal praise or approving comments. Her mate had just observed her unobtrusively and it had allowed her to soak up the contentment that spread throughout his mind. Another two point five minutes later he had fallen asleep, and she shared the images that came to him in his sleep. While the bond was still too immature to project images or thoughts when they were both awake, his completely exposed sleeping mind projected it's images while she meditated.

Even though he had fallen asleep, she had seen no logic in getting dressed again. They were the only sentient beings on the whole continent, the temperature was sufficiently warm and she found the activity strangely invigorating. It gave her a new perspective on Ensign Sato's claim that divesting herself of all or almost all clothing in her own quarters allowed her to 'leave duty at pile of clothes next to the door'.

The fact that the simple act of not wearing clothing had such a profoundly positive effect on her mate's contentment provided her with a sufficiently logical reason to do so and as an added bonus she would not have to admit that she found it most agreeable herself.

Her current sensory impairment was the result of the images he had shared with her while he slept. It had never occurred to her to change the position in which they had mated twice before. After all it was perfectly suitable for uncomplicated penetration and stimulated all pertinent nerve endings to allow them both to climax.

Only when she had observed the new position through his eyes when his sleeping mind freely projected the images through the bond had she realized that by her being on top of him, she allowed him better access for his hands to stimulate her sensitive mammary features – another aspect that they both could benefit from.

The fact that her vision was still recovering was ample proof that her theory was more than sound. After he had woken up, she had mounted him, making part of the images he had shared a reality. That decision had also provided the answer to a question that had simmered in her mind – she now knew the source of the faint undercurrent of dissatisfaction that she felt whenever she touched him and thus got a clear indication of his emotional state.

The fact that this disagreeable trace of emotions went away almost instantly in the moment she had invited him to mate in a different posture made her realize that as a human he preferred variety in their intimate activities; and that meant she would have to investigate human mating practices and which one of them were possible to be performed by a Vulcan female. Due to Ensign Sato's occasional aversion to wearing clothing in the privacy of her own quarters she knew that there were no major anatomical differences between human and Vulcan females.

Logic would dictate that she should seek counsel from Doctor Phlox, as he could be expected to be most experienced due to the rather complicated family structures of his world and his species' sexual freedom. But it wasn't an option she was willing to take. Ensign Sato, her long-time mentor in understanding human behavior and the only real friend she had made among the crew – other than her mate of course – was the only one with whom she felt comfortable enough to discuss such intimate topics. Contrary to her public image, Ensign Sato was by far not as innocent a person as everybody believed, and T'Pol hoped that the young communications officer could help her in her efforts to become a more desirable mate for her _Ashayam_.

"T'Pol? You coming back?" she registered the muffled voice of her chosen as her sense of hearing started to return.

"I will soon have recovered, beloved," she answered and idly let her hand glide over his muscular chest that her head was resting on.

T'Pol was content and she could sense that her mate was as well. Only the irritating buzz of an insect she had not been able to locate so far, prevented her from reaching a perfect equilibrium.


	4. Bridging the Divide

**3. Bridging the Divide**

It was a quiet day on the bridge. Everybody minded his or her own business, running scans, diagnostics or whatever was available to fight the boredom of flying through friendly space. Due to the latest incidents with Augments and Orions, Starfleet had ordered the ship to stay closer to home, leaving the job of traipsing around in unknown space to find exciting new worlds to _Columbia_. It didn't exactly do much for the mood of the crew, and Jon wasn't sure how long it would take until the first crewmen would experience acute cabin fever.

_"Еб твою мать, блин!" _

Nobody except Ensign Sato could make any sense of Trip's latest outburst, that had abruptly pulled them out of the collective lull on the bridge. The furiously angry engineer had run off the bridge, so naturally all eyes were fixed on Hoshi with an unspoken request to translate.

"You don't wanna know," Hoshi answered the questioning glances with a flushed face. Captain Archer had a sense of déja-vu.

A slight shudder of the ship made the bridge crew aware of the fact that _Enterprise_ had unexpectedly dropped out of warp and turned their attention away from Trip's new-found language skills for a moment toward finding an explanation for the sudden drop in speed. Though it was entirely possible that the two were connected.

"T'Pol," Captain Archer ordered, tilting his head in the direction of the turbo lift. "Lieutenant Reed, you have the bridge."

"Aye, Sir."

=/\=

"Any idea what Trip's little outburst was all about?" the captain asked as they walked towards engineering. "That sounded like Russian or something."

"It would be a logical conclusion. Commander Tucker mentioned that his second forefather Anthony Tucker lived in Russia."

"A Tucker in Russia?" Archer asked back in disbelief. Now that was a story he wanted to find out about.

"According to Commander Tucker it had something to do with... 'a gal from Anadyr'," T'Pol explained with an elevated eyebrow, and Jon laughed about her stilted use of human slang.

"Hoshi looked quite embarrassed, so maybe it's really better not to know, what Trip said," he mused as they reached the entrance of Engineering. They arrived just in time to see Trip dive away from an exploding EPS conduit, while a fountain of sparks scorched his uniform.

_"Ебанный в рот!"_ Trip swore as he scrambled to get on his feet again.

"I never heard you cuss a blue-streak in Russian before," the ship's commanding officer said, bewildered, while lending Trip a hand to help him back on his feet.

"Well, I've never been pissed off like that before," Trip returned angrily, his face red from the heat and his anger. "Seriously, next time we're on Jupiter Station, I'll boot some of those dimwits out the nearest airlock."

"Maybe it would be in the interest of all involved if you reverted to speaking Russian," T'Pol delivered deadpan, and the captain saw that she was obviously having a calming effect on him, if only a little.

"No, really." Trip continued in exasperation. "What's the use of bein' capable of warp 5.5, if half of engineering blows up every time we try to give 'er the beans? I can't _believe_ how they jury-rigged the damned EPS grid. That's the sort of shit you'd expect from an office temp with a bad attitude. Those guys are supposed to be engineers. If someone of my team had delivered such a crap job, he'd be cleanin' the latrines with a tooth brush."

"Enough, Trip!" Archer interrupted his chief's rant, but couldn't keep a smile off his face. He knew that Trip's language could get colorful, but he had not heard him swear like that too often. He was sure that T'Pol had not understood even half of it. "What's the problem?"

"Watch this," Trip explained and opened a schematic of the EPS grid. "They couldn't expand this power line, so they jury-rigged a bypass without installin' stronger conduits. That's OK up to five point two, maybe point three, but as soon as we go faster, the shit goes flyin' and hits the fan."

The captain nearly laughed out loud when he could see how T'Pol's mind had probably started calculating a reasonable meaning for a metaphor of airborne excrement colliding with a primitive rotating air conditioning device. But she came up short if her confused look at the engineer was anything to go by.

"Can we correct it?" he asked, redirecting his attention away from the fascinating interaction between his officers back to the state of his ship. "And more importantly, why didn't we notice it before?"

"As for why we didn't notice it," the engineer explained pushing his sweat-soaked hair back with his right hand. That bypass was installed after the Klingon Augments gig, together with the new tamper-proof crypto-routines, and since I was officially a displaced crew member of _Columbia, _I had no access to the engineerin' reports from Jupiter station. So you might wanna ask Kelby how he could miss something as blatantly wrong as this!"

"Trip, I didn't say you're to blame," the captain said in a conciliatory tone. The engineer was right of course. During their short stop-over after resolving the Klingon crisis Kelby had overseen the repairs. But he hadn't gotten an answer to the most pressing question, so he repeated it. "Can you repair it?" .

"Yeah, but that'll mean double shifts for at least a week and we'll run short on spares in the process."

"T'Pol will assist you with that," Jon decided. "I'll contact Gardner that we're returning to Jupiter station to pick up spares and have them clean up the mess they made. We might just as well send the crew on shore leave, while we're at it. It has been a while anyway, and we didn't get a chance to do so last time."

"Like the sound of 'at, Cap'n," the younger man replied with a tired grin. "Just make sure none of those imbeciles touches my engines ever again without me knowin' about it."

"I'll keep that in mind," Archer answered with a grin of his own and left Engineering. Shore leave was definitely in order. Those one and a half days on the planet had helped, but Trip was nowhere near back to his old self.

=/\=

"May I?" T'Pol asked, pausing with the tray of food still in her hands.

"Of course," Hoshi nodded and the Vulcan took the indicated free seat on the opposite side of the table. "Where's Commander Tucker?"

"He remained in Engineering. It is often unwise to interrupt him, when he is... repairing his engines," she replied dryly. "I'll take some food to him when I return to Engineering."

She saw the young human smile at this comment.

"Congratulations, by the way," the ensign said. "I've heard the Commander has finally moved in."

"Indeed and I wish to thank you for your advice about 'pulling my thumb out of my rectum'," T'Pol replied straight-faced. "Would you assist me with another linguistic problem, Ensign?"

"Sure, Commander."

"I am experiencing difficulties in understanding some of Commander Tuckers recently-used colorful phrases, like his metaphor of 'excrement colliding with a fan'."

She could see Hoshi choke on her sandwich, desperately trying not to laugh out loud.

"That is one of a more _mature_ variety, Commander," the young woman admitted when she could finally speak again.

"I suspected that. Commander Tucker's speech was quite... animated," the science officer agreed.

"That's putting it mildly," Hoshi answered, a blush creeping up her face. She was obviously remembering the Russian swearing from the incident on the Bridge earlier.

"Would you explain what Commander Tucker expressed in Russian?"

"No way!" The shocked expression on her face made it clear that the words really must have been fairly unmentionable. "I really meant it, when I said that you don't wanna know what it means. Russian swearing can be somewhat... ripe."

"I see. I suppose it is better for all involved, that the universal translator did not manage to translate it," T'Pol said with an elevated brow.

"Well, such phrases have been left out deliberately," Hoshi answered with a sigh of relief. "Regarding these... colorful phrases, I'll set up a database for you, Commander. You can then add new phrases whenever you encounter them."

"Thank you, Ensign. I expect that Commander Tucker will be a constant source of them."

"No doubt about that," she answered with a smile. "How about meeting in my quarters after the shift? We can go through the phrases that you didn't understand."

"That sounds agreeable, although we may not cover all the phrases. You will, after all, need some time to rest before your next shift."

Hoshi laughed softly at the dry suggestion, while T'Pol regarded her with an amused eyebrow lift.

=/\=

"Hi again, Cath," Jon said with a smile when the face of Trip's mother Cathryn reappeared on screen.

"Thanks for callin' back, Jon. These subspace transmissions cost an arm and a leg."

He could see the embarrassed look on the older woman's face. He always had felt that it was a shame that Starfleet couldn't spare some subspace time for close relatives of the crewmen they sent out for years. The least he could do was call her back immediately to spare her the costs.

"Don't worry about that, Cath," he said, still smiling at her reassuringly. "They should have given you a subspace channel allocation to begin with. Take it as my way of correcting that oversight."

"You won't get into trouble?" she asked back, and it was plain she was still worried.

"No," he answered. "It's my job as the captain to look after my crew and when my third in command is having a family situation, it's my job to help."

"How is he?" the gray-haired woman asked. "He's still not answerin' any messages."

"Can't say I blame him," Jon said. "He showed me the message he got from his father when we returned from the Expanse. I'm not gonna lie to you, Cath. That was the most disgusting diatribe I've ever read. But to answer your first question. Trip is well, very well in fact."

He was slightly taken aback when he saw tears running down the woman's face. He wasn't sure if they were tears of joy about Trip being well or tears of grief over losing contact. At a guess, it was probably a bit of both.

"I didn't know about that message," she admitted. "Charlie wrote it when I was in church. He was blind drunk that day, like he was so often in the first year after Lizzie's death."

"Is he getting help?" Jon asked in shock. Hearing that Trip's dad had a drinking problem was a serious blow. After he'd met Trip during the Warp Two project, they had spent so many weekends in Florida, listening to the seasoned engineer's tales. Charles Tucker jr. was not a guy to spurn a beer or two after a long day's work, but he had never seen him more than mildly drunk.

"He helped himself," Cath explained. "You know him. He never drank hard stuff, just beer. Thankfully it wasn't enough to get him addicted, well at least not physically."

"But mentally," His suspicions were confirmed when he saw her nod.

"Jon, he literally had to learn how to fall asleep again. It was no problem not to drink anything, but he had gotten so used to emptyin' one bottle after the other until he got tired, his body had sort of forgotten how to fall asleep when he was sober. And the nightmares..."

"Is he better now?" It was hardly surprising that Charles Tucker Senior had had nightmares, having lost his daughter in such a way; nevertheless Jon was taken aback by the horror in her face.

"He was so shocked and ashamed when he heard that Trip went to Vulcan instead of comin' home, he admitted to writin' the message and asked Father Garret for help."

"Wouldn't a doctor have been the better choice?" As a confirmed atheist, he was doubtful about the fact that they had preferred a pastor over a medic.

"His problem was up _here_ and down _here_," Cathryn replied, tapping her temple with her index finger, before doing the same with her heart. "Father Garret helped us grieve for Lizzie, and he helped Charlie out this time too. Only the rift with Trip. That's not something he can help us with."

"Maybe I can," Jon said with conviction. "I have a gut feeling that he might be much more willing to reconcile now."

The glum expression on the face of Trip's mother turned into a wide, hopeful grin, and the captain wondered briefly if he'd been too hasty with his assessment of the situation. Still, it was too late to retract it now, and Cath needed some good news if anyone did.

"Jon, tell me, did he finally get together with that Vulcan lady, T'Pol? "

The captain fidgeted. On one hand he wanted to give her hope by acknowledging the recent development between his two bridge officers, but on the other hand he didn't want to spoil a surprise Trip might want to spring on them himself.

"That's all I need to know," the elder woman said softly. "You're a good man, Jon, not wantin' to spoil the surprise, but really, he's written about nothin' else than her for god knows how long. And you're sayin' he is _really_ well..."

"He'll kill me when he finds out that you learned all this from me." He put on a comic grimace of apprehension.

"No he won't," she insisted. "'Far as we're concerned, you haven't told us anything. If he would just speak to us again…"

"I'll have a talk with him, Cath. But I won't sugarcoat it for you. His dad is in for being read the Riot Act. He wrote things about T'Pol in that message that were not exactly printable and you have no idea how fiercely protective they are of each other."

He was taken aback by the scowl on Cathryn's face.

"Jon, trust me, it can't be worse than the Riot Act that _I _read him. And even if he's better now, a little refresher can't hurt. Charlie's done a lot of good after the Xindi attack, but nothing justifies what he's done to himself and to Trip and T'Pol, and trust me – he knows that by now."

"I'll do my best to help," he promised, sending her a reassuring smile.

=/\=

"I apologize for the delay," T'Pol said, when Hoshi had called her in. "Cleaning myself after a double shift of helping Trip in Engineering took considerably longer than expected."

The young human, who was currently fully-clad rather than in her preferred unclothed state, raised an eyebrow in obvious amusement. T'Pol surmised that her attempts at concealing the after-effects of the deep intimate satisfaction from the encounter in the shower were obviously not very successful. Her friend apparently knew that 'cleaning herself' was not the only activity she had engaged in.

"I'm not hiding it well, am I?" she asked dryly. Hoshi was the only other human from whom she couldn't hide her emotions. As an expert in body language the young linguist tended to know exactly how others felt, even without outward emotional responses.

"Well, you could have cooled down a bit longer," the other woman replied with a knowing smile, pointing at her bust.

T'Pol looked down along her own body and saw that her nipples were still erect and pressing against the fabric of her uniform. Most likely that was a result of the satisfied buzz in her mind with which the exhilarating shower experience had left her. Her brows twitched in recognition of this oversight, but Hoshi's expression of amusement put her mind at rest; nobody else had seen her on the way to her current location and Hoshi could be trusted with such intimate knowledge.

The young ensign's breasts, covered by lose shirt, bounced slightly as she laughed softly. In the early days of their friendship, the human's predilection for greeting her in a state of partial undress (for instance only wearing pants) had been slightly uncomfortable, but over time she had grown used to this peculiar aspect of the young ensign's personality. Having recently sampled the unfamiliar sensation of undressing for no other purposes than personal comfort and bringing contentment to her mate, she understood the motives behind it better than before.

"Did you bring some 'colorful metaphors'?" Hoshi asked, still visibly amused.

"Yes. The first one refers to someone 'going primate excrement'," T'Pol explained, taking the offered seat while poking at her PADD.

"Apeshit," Hoshi corrected.

"I believe that was the exact word."

"Well, a more printable variant would be 'going mad', which means that someone gets very angry or irritated."

"So it would be a correct use of the phrase to say that Trip went… 'apeshit' earlier today?"

"Maybe not a good phrase for a staff meeting, but you're correct," the young woman confirmed.

"I encountered another animal related phrase, when he told me that Lt. Rostov made a 'dog's breakfast' of adjusting the intermix ratio."

"Ah, that's one that he must have picked up from Malcolm," Hoshi said and T'Pol noticed the longing in the younger woman's look. She decided to inquire about that after their linguistic exchange. "It's a British phrase, which means that someone failed very badly at completing a seemingly routine task. It likens the situation to a cooking mishap the unfortunate result of which will be fed to the dog."

"Understood," the Vulcan acknowledged, recording the new information. "There was an exchange during which Trip informed me that he would force a crew member to emit animal noises."

"What was the exact phrase?"

T'Pol took a few moments to remember and imitated Trip's dialect. "I believe the exact phrase was 'I'll make that dang numbnut squeal like a piggy'."

=/\=

Hoshi doubled over and howled with laughter. She had never heard a Vulcan drawl before. Inwardly she was amazed by T'Pol's proficiency in mimicking Trips southern twang. Pictures came up in her mind of Trip and her friend practicing Southern drawl in their quarters, which fueled her laughter even more.

"It is a metaphor for punishing someone," she explained once she had regained her composure. "It can also be used as a metaphor for the intention to torture someone, but I doubt Trip had that in mind."

"Since he spoke about Commander Kelby at the time, I would not rule out the possibility," T'Pol remarked deadpan and Hoshi couldn't help but laugh again.

"So, any more phrases?" she asked after another giggle.

"There was one phrase today, which described that he would task a crew member with 'cleaning the latrines using a toothbrush.'"

"That's a phrase that comes from Germany. The original words are '_Der kann mit der Zahnbürste den Donnerbalken durchsägen._' It's a somewhat comical metaphor for severe punishment," Unlikely as it was, every explanation just got funnier. If someone would record T'Pol's attempts at grasping Trip's colorful language, it would make her a comedy star. "Since there are quite a few Germans in Engineering, I'd suspect he picked it up from one of them."

"I see. Thank you for your assistance, Hoshi."

"You're welcome," the linguist answered and watched the Vulcan while she stowed away her PADD.

"May I ask a private question? You may decline to answer if it is too invasive."

She looked at her Vulcan friend with interest, slightly surprised by the question. Sometimes T'Pol could still be confusing to outside parties. By Vulcan standards their whole conversation had been private if nothing else, indicated by the fact that they addressed each other by their first names. What might be normal for humans was definitely not so for Vulcans.

"Go ahead," she offered, knowing that something very personal was about to be discussed.

=/\=

"Trip recently stated that he saw 'sparks flying' between you and Lt. Reed." T'Pol noticed Hoshi's immediate and pronounced blush. "While I do not see the connection between a discharge of static electricity and a romantic relationship, I too have seen signs of mutual affection between you and Mr. Reed. Is this a correct assumption?"

"That depends whether I'm talking to my superior officer or to my friend T'Pol," the young human answered, and T'Pol could hear the edge of anxiety in her voice.

"If this were a conversation in an official context I would have had to reprimand you for violation of the uniform code during some of our prior meetings," T'Pol remarked dryly, seeing the human relax slightly. "Since I did not, it should be obvious that our ranks have no place here. And my opinion would be the same in either capacity anyway."

"Well, you're right," Hoshi answered with a smile that T'Pol interpreted as being caused by a mixture of positive emotions, but also by sadness or even frustration. "I like Malcolm a lot, and if his body language is any indication, he likes me a lot, too. But with the no-frat rules, he would never make a move or even accept a date. He's too strict an officer to go against regulations."

"That is why I asked," the Vulcan explained calmly, seeing that Trip's assessment of the situation was correct. "Captain Archer did not make it publicly known to avoid encouraging too much fraternization, but he has the authority to exempt crew members from these regulations, if their duties are not influenced by a romantic relationship. As we speak, Trip is informing Mr. Reed about it, so you might well expect some... 'moves' to be made."

"More likely I'll have to make them myself," Hoshi answered, and T'Pol thought that only Phlox could rival the brightness of her friend's smile, though it quickly became thoughtful. "Malcolm is so introverted, I can almost see him brooding for weeks before he comes up with the _chutzpah_ to ask me out on a date."

"That was Trip's assessment as well, That was why he proposes that we should invite both of you to accompany us to the next movie night and then to a dinner in our quarters – if you are both agreeable of course."

"A double date." The ensign squealed happily. T'Pol returned her impulsive hug, albeit somewhat stiffly. She had no problem with Hoshi hugging her, except when she was partially unclothed, which thankfully did not apply this day. "I'd like that, T'Pol." Doubt struck her, however: "As long as Malcolm will go for it…"

"Then it will depend on Lieutenant Reed's consent," T'Pol said and nodded acceptance of Hoshi's unspoken apology for her exuberance, expressed by a regretful look on releasing her. "But since - in Trips words – 'he has it bad for you', I would consider it a mere formality."

"Thank you, both of you." And there was no doubt that the words were heartfelt.

=/\=

"I would like to ask a favor of you," T'Pol said next, a slightly greenish tinge coloring her cheeks at the intended new subject, whatever it was.

"Well, I'd say I owe you a big one," Hoshi said, still feeling giddy at the prospect of going on a date with the ship's armory officer, who had seemed unattainable for so long.

"It is a question about... intimate matters," her guest explained haltingly. "More precisely, the matter of mating."

"Oh dear." It was easy to imagine how difficult it must be for her Vulcan friend to talk about something that private, even though they had been friends for close to three years now.

"If this inconveniences you..."

"No, no, not at all," she reassured her visitor quickly. "I'm just surprised that you'd even broach the topic. It must be very hard for you to talk about it."

"It is uncomfortable," T'Pol confirmed. "But it is of importance for me to learn about human intimate customs if I am to be a suitable mate for Trip."

"Did he complain about something?" Hoshi asked, slightly surprised. "Sorry to be so blunt, but since you asked, when you came here you didn't look like there were any problems in the intimate department."

"Trip would not complain about anything if I developed a habit of hitting him in his sleep," T'Pol replied, causing Hoshi to laugh while making tea – she had decided that giving her visitor something to hold on to would stop the fidgeting she had begun when broaching the intimate topic.

"Well, you certainly don't need help with your humor," she said with an encouraging smile, and handed the Vulcan a large cup of chamomile tea. She sat back onto the bunk. "So if Trip isn't complaining, why do you want to repair something that's not broken?"

"The absence of complaints does not mean there is nothing wrong." The greenish blush grew more pronounced. "Until very recently I did not even know that humans preferred different postures during … the activity."

"I can see where that could be a bit of a problem," Hoshi agreed and looked into her cup to give her friend a moment to fight the blush in relative privacy. "Have you … researched … the topic?" It sounded the logical thing for a Vulcan to do.

"I tried," the Vulcan said. "To my surprise, the ship's multimedia database even contains practical displays of the activity. I watched a recording called 'Debbie Does The Alpha Quadrant', but I have serious doubts about its representativeness of actual human mating. It appeared to be somewhat random and primitive, and what little experience I have with it contradicts that."

Hoshi barely managed to put the cup down before she started laughing uncontrollably. She knew that was a very bad idea, considering the discomfort T'Pol felt at broaching the topic, but the sheer thought of a flabbergasted Vulcan trying to learn about human sexuality by watching one of the crudest porn flicks known to humankind had shattered her attempts at keeping a straight face.

"I'm so sorry, T'Pol," she said, her eyes moist with mirth. "I didn't mean to laugh, but how in the name of all that's holy did you stumble on that trash?"

"It had by far the highest access count," the Vulcan explained.

Hoshi shook her head. "That's because some men aboard have gone nearly four years without any sex. Trust me, you don't want to know why they watch junk like that."

"Do you know of any more helpful material?" T'Pol asked earnestly. "If I have learned anything from that recording, the range of possible techniques in human mating appears rather overwhelming. In fact some methods seemed quite effective in allowing the participants to mate without being in danger of conception."

Hoshi had to stop herself from laughing again. Only a scientist would assess some of the 'harder stuff' by its potential to be used safely during the tricky time of the month.

"What you saw was having sex for the sake of having sex," she explained. "Trust me, Trip would not like that. For him it is 'making love'. I bet he doesn't like it when you say that you 'mate'."

"He expressed his displeasure," T'Pol confirmed. "And indeed 'making love' is the term he prefers. But what is the difference between ordinary intercourse and 'making love'?"

"That's not something you can research using a database. It's much too intimate and you can only find out by yourselves. It's a complex system of how you touch your partner, where and what you do to make him feel good and of course the other way round as well. Most of all, it's what you _feel _about what you're doing and who you're doing it with. Humans can have sex with someone they don't know and don't care about, just for the physical thrill of it. Making love, on the other hand, is something you only do with someone you do care about."

"He is most skilled," T'Pol blurted out, and Hoshi looked down to give her some privacy when she saw the look of embarrassment at the divulging of intimate details, but she plowed on bravely. "I am virtually unable to return the pleasure due to my inexperience,"

"I think I have an idea." Hoshi grabbed a PADD from a nearby shelf, cleared its data storage and started downloading several items from the ship's library.

"This should help you learn about romance and 'making love'," she said with a reassuring smile and handed over the PADD. "And now I'm going to tell you something you could try."

=/\=

T'Pol returned to their quarters after a long and at times difficult talk with Hoshi. The absence of her mate meant that he was probably still talking to Malcolm. She stopped in her tracks for a moment when she noticed that she had referred to Lieutenant Reed by his first name, even if only in her mind.

On second thought she realized that it was only a logical consequence. His predictable agreement pending, she would visit movie night with him, Hoshi and Trip in two days' time; and since he was the closest friend of her mate and most likely starting a romantic relationship with Hoshi, who was her closest friend, it would be logical to improve their interaction on a personal level as well. Hoshi and Trip would experience a certain awkwardness if she were to remain distant from the ship's tactical officer.

She realized that she would have long been open to the idea of striking up a friendship with the introverted lieutenant, as she admired his tactical finesse and in a way he was the closest any human had ever gotten to reaching the level of self-control that many Vulcans strove to achieve. That control, however, had caused him to keep as much distance between himself and the rest of the crew as she did. Like herself, he only had a single close friend – her mate. She wondered if he would be equally open to the idea of replacing their professional distance with a more companionable interaction in a private setting.

Her wandering thoughts returned to the conversation with Hoshi. Her friend's suggestion of what she should try to improve her next intimate encounter with Trip – which, barring accidents, would happen no later than tomorrow, given their current level of desire for each other – was as simple as it was logical. T'Pol reasoned that her own worries of being unsuitable or inferior to a human mate had clouded her judgment and caused her to miss this obvious option.

She activated the PADD to peruse the texts Hoshi had given her. To her surprise, these were not scientific studies of human sexuality. According to the ship's communications officer, it was a series of works describing a decade in the life of a human couple, apparently without omitting details of their intimate relations. Although it had been written one hundred and fifty years ago, Hoshi had assured her that it was still representative of the intimate life of contemporary humans, and understanding the concept of romance was a worthwhile goal, considering that her chosen seemed to be quite interested in it.

She began to read eagerly.

_Dance of a Lifetime, by Frank Downey._


	5. Double Date

**Double Date**

Trip waited politely for the door chime to be answered and entered Malcolm's quarters in response to the call from within.

"Hey Malcolm, do you have a minute?"

"Sure," the Brit answered, waving Trip to take a seat before glancing at him slyly. "I've heard your cabin has grown considerably in size."

"Yeah, I almost passed out when we came home from that short shore leave," he answered with a chuckle.

Malcolm opened a nondescript drawer and took out a bottle, holding it in Trip's direction as an unspoken offer.

"The ship's most law-abidin'officer has a secret stash of beer?" The question was accompanied by a grin.

"We obviously all have our dark secrets, Commander," Malcolm replied dryly as Trip took the proffered object.

"Thanks, buddy."

"So, what happened to 'I should never have gotten involved with her'?"

"Well, she finally gave up her reluctance to admit the obvious, that's what happened."

"Obviously," came Malcolm's dry reply. "I think that, except for the two of you, pretty much everyone knew that one day you'd end up sharing the same address. The fact that _I_ noticed it should tell you something."

"Tell me about it," Trip said with a chuckle.

"The Captain seems remarkably laid back about it, if I may say so."

"Yeah, good on him. Actually, that's why I'm here, Malcolm. I think I know whom _you'd_ like to 'share an address' with." Trip took a swig and regarded Malcolm with a mischievous grin.

"You do?" The Brit's attempt at appearing both surprised and flippant was not too convincing, and Trip knew he'd hit a bulls-eye. Normally Malcolm was excellent at hiding what was going on in his mind. He'd been caught off guard, and wasn't nearly as indifferent as he probably wanted to seem.

"Look, even T'Pol sees that you and Hoshi have it bad for each other. In fact, at this very minute she and Hoshi are havin' a little girl talk."

"You know that it isn't possible," Malcolm answered, turning away. His sadness was poorly hidden. "You and T'Pol have the same rank. The Captain would never be so benevolent about it if I started dating a subordinate."

"He will, buddy. Jon didn't make any announcement, because he doesn't want his ship to turn into a high school, but Forrest gave him permission to exempt people from the no-frat rules, as long as it doesn't impact job performance. If anyone on this ship could separate duty and private time as good as T'Pol, it'd be you."

Malcolm slid a dubious glance at him. "So you honestly believe that Captain Archer would allow a lieutenant to date an ensign?" He could hardly have sounded more disbelieving if Trip had claimed that Earth was flat.

"Hell, he'd allow you to date Porthos as long as you do your job on the bridge." Both men shared a laugh about that, even as Reed thanked him wryly for the mental image the words had conjured up.

"You're welcome," Trip quipped and they clinked the bottles together before a taking swig of their beer.

He'd expected the Brit to be delighted, and was surprised by the lack of response. He waited to see what would be forthcoming. Maybe he shouldn't be so surprised after all, he reflected; Malcolm was a tactical officer, and trained to look for pitfalls. And if ever there was a pitfall going, Malcolm Reed was the man to find it.

"I like the news," the lieutenant sighed at last with a far-away look. "And I'll think about it."

"'Think about it'?" Trip asked with a mock-incredulous look that soon turned into a grin. "You've had it bad for Hoshi for, what? Two years now – and you need to _think about it_?"

"Actually three," Malcolm admitted shyly. It was uncharacteristic for him to be so open, and he glanced a little uneasily at his companion, as though wondering whether it was wise to admit to so much. "Ever since we barbecued the Klingons on that deuterium mining colony. I can even tell you the moment my eyes were opened: when she took the rifle off me and took over the training class. A gorgeous girl who's good with weapons, who can resist that?"

"You should see T'Pol wielding a staff, hm...," Trip added as both broke into laughter again.

"Actually, Mal," he continued more seriously, "I already expected you to start broodin' over it, probably for weeks. That's why we decided to make next movie-night into a double-date. T'Pol's proposin' the same to Hoshi and you know what her answer will be."

"She'll probably refuse me flat out. Or squeal like a schoolgirl – 'ooh, T'Pol, I'd like that'," Malcolm quipped in a not very convincing imitation of Hoshi's voice, and the two friends shared a chuckle and another swig of beer. It was good to see that the Brit was at least willing to entertain the idea, even if his customary lack of self-confidence in his own attractions was still fighting manfully. He was looking distinctly thoughtful, if not exactly hopeful.

"Did you know that T'Pol and Hoshi have been havin'some sort of girl chats ever since we ran into that Romulan mine?" Trip asked.

"Now there's a surprise. How did that come about?"

"Actually, I think I might have had something to do with it. A few weeks before that, T'Pol had started havin' trouble in her science department. People wanted to be transferred to other departments, mainly Engineerin'. So she came to me one day, asking for advice. We started to have regular meals together about then."

"You have no idea how hyped up the rumour mill was when that happened," Malcolm snorted. "Half the female contingent was hell bent on getting closer to you, but you started to have meals with the resident Vulcan, of all people. I don't think Anna Hess ever really got over it that she never had a chance to bed you." For a man who'd never been known to gossip, Reed certainly knew some surprising things. But then, as head of security on the ship, it was probably one of his duties to know what went on – he was a bit like that wise old owl in the oak tree, who heard much because he said little.

"It wasn't for lack of tryin'," Trip said, feeling compassion for the frustration of his extroverted second in command. "I mean don't get me wrong, she's a gorgeous girl an' all, and she 'accidentally' walked in on me in the shower often enough. But I knew I wasn't just one of her flings for her, she had more substantial hopes. I have to work with her every day. It would've been too awkward to let her built up any hopes that I would have to disappoint."

"You're a better man than your reputation suggests," Malcolm needled him.

"Ha ha," Trip shot back in mock indignation. "Anyway, to get back to Hoshi and T'Pol... After Hoshi was injured by that explodin'mine, I asked T'Pol how she was and she didn't know, because she saw no logical reason to ask. For her it was logical that Phlox would say something if there were problems in 'Ensign Sato's healing process'. I explained how much it meant for crewmen if their boss dropped by now and then while they were laid up in sickbay."

"And she took your advice?"

"Obviously. Ever since then she's gone to Hoshi whenever she's confused about some human behavior or language. And with me teasin' the hell out of her, you can imagine that she's had plenty reasons to ask Hoshi about it."

"I can imagine. So the two of them are actually friends?"

"In human terms, they're the best of friends – y'know, the type of girls who chat endlessly about how good their men were in bed last night. If there's anyone on board, who knows even half as much about T'Pol as I do, it's Hoshi."

"I have trouble imagining T'Pol gossiping about your shagging performance," Malcolm chuckled, but then paused to scowl theatrically. "And I'm damned if I want my own failings the subject of open debate – that if there's ever anything _to_ discuss. What the girls talk about between themselves is up to them, but there are some things a senior officer does _not _need to know about."

Trip grinned. His years in Engineering had rubbed off any shyness he might ever have laid claim to, but he knew that the reticent Brit would be mortified by having his private life made public, even between friends.

"Well, probably not that, but for Vulcans, tellin' their age is considered somewhat intimate and Hoshi knows T'Pol's age. That should tell you something."

"I've never heard T'Pol address her as anything but 'Ensign Sato', though." The news of Hoshi and T'Pol being such close friends had evidently come as a surprise.

"That's because she doesn't – not in public anyway. Hoshi told me she does so in private, but apparently even that took quite some convincin'."

"Have you noticed how much T'Pol's changed lately? Sometimes I think she's almost trying to become human, like cracking that joke in sickbay for instance."

Trip shook his head. "She's not tryin' to become human, but she _is _trying to blend in more. That's just T'Pol's logic. She's in a relationship with a human on a human ship. The same way, she'll expect me to stop grinnin' at everything and to hold back on laughin' when we're among Vulcans. We're trying to find some compromise that doesn't require her to become too human or me to become too Vulcan. I'm quite surprised at how many concessions she's willing to make though."

"Seems to work though. You two look good together," Malcolm said as he chucked the empty bottles into the recycler.

"Works great so far. Gotta go, Mal." He stood up to leave. "The Cap'n wanted to see me."

"Trip," Malcolm called after his retreating friend. He hadn't moved, and his expression was still more wistful than optimistic, but the usually cool gray eyes had warmth in them. "Thank you."

"You're welcome," Trip nodded, turning back just short of the door. "Knowin' about your little secret stash now, I'll probably blackmail you into sharin'some now an' again." It was less of a threat than a subtle request, and he knew by the chuckle from the recipient that it had been understood as such.

"Go bother the captain, you greedy git."

He reflected as the door hissed shut behind him that it wasn't just T'Pol who'd changed. Whether he knew it or not, Malcolm Reed's formidable defenses were slowly coming down as well.

=/\=

Something was definitely wrong. After her mate had not returned three hours after his meeting with Lieutenant Reed, she had visited the quarters of the Armory officer, fearing that the men might have inebriated themselves. Contrary to the lieutenant's belief, she was quite aware of his secret cache of alcoholic beverages; she did regular ship-wide scans for various allergens known to threaten some of the crew members, and Crewman Carson from science was allergic to hops.

But the lieutenant had insisted that Trip had left over an hour ago to meet the captain, and since he did not appear drunk, despite traces of the smell of alcohol on his breath, she had believed his explanation and had instead initiated a ship-wide scan from the science office, finally locating the chief engineer at his usual working place.

But when she had arrived at his office, she found it locked, and after making sure that nobody could see her she entered her override code and went into the office. She stopped in shock when she found him, his head resting on his folded arms on the desk. He was crying.

Quickly she locked the door again, lest anyone see him in this condition. She touched his shoulders gently but to her shocked surprise, her gentle touch only served to increase the severity of his sobs. He spun around, flinging his arms around her waist, and rested his head on her abdomen, still inconsolable in whatever grief or emotional confusion had gripped him. He had been fairly emotional for rhe last few days, despite the short respite on the island.

Seeing a PADD on the table, she carefully picked it up. It contained several communications between him and his family and since he saw what she was doing and made no move to stop her, she started to read them. Soon she began to understand the reason for her mate's distress.

The first missive was one he had received shortly after their return from the Expanse, a letter from his father, and she had to summon all her remaining control over her emotions to avoid an openly emotional reaction to what she read. His paternal parent, obviously in the grip of grief for his deceased daughter, expressed his displeasure with alien presence on Earth in grammatically rather poor style. Shortly after this the communication descended into a rather unspeakable denunciation of Trip's obvious attraction to her, and she herself was described in singularly unpleasant terms. A primal rage threatened to overwhelm her at the thought of the hurt his parent's words would inevitably have caused her mate.

The lengthy period between this communication and the next one made it clear that there had been a substantial period of communication silence between Trip and his family, something she knew would hurt him just as much as his father's unseemly statements. This one, however, seemed to be of a more conciliatory nature.

_Dear son, _

_Now, five months after I sent it, your mother sat me down and made me re-read the diatribe I sent you when you came back from that Xindi mission. Words cannot describe how ashamed I am of myself._

_I was blind drunk at the time, but that's no excuse. Your mother refuses to say anything, but ever since Lizzie died I've never seen her this happy, so I can only guess that the good news has come from you, considering that Danny is still stuck in denial. I sincerely hope that you and T'Pol have finally made things work between you. Your mother had hoped to invite you both to our new home when you came back. She even had found out about T'Pol's mother's address to invite her as well. I guess I don't need to explain what happened when she found out I had driven you to go to Vulcan instead, knowing how you hate the desert. _

_It's hard to find a way to say sorry for something that cannot be forgiven. I've said things about the woman you love that mark me down as a raging xenophobe and the worst father you could think of. It would be easy to blame the alcohol, but the truth is, those prejudices must have been there beforehand. The alcohol just made it easier to express them. _

_We've spent a lot of time getting help from Father Martin and I think I am better now. Maybe I shouldn't have been too stubborn to accept his help earlier. But however things are now, I can't undo what I have done to the Lady you're obviously in love with. If you can't forgive me, I will only have myself to blame, but I ask one __t__hing of you – please don't make your mother pay for my idiocy. I beg you son, please contact her at least. I will stay out of it if you wish, but Cath should not have to pay for my faults. _

_Please forgive me, if you can._

_Dad. _

It took her a while to control her own emotional reaction to the two letters. It was hardly believable that both communications had been written by the same man, but the grammatical accuracy and the vastly improved spelling made it obvious that the second letter was not written under the influence of a debilitating substance.

She could feel that her mate had exhausted his energy. Taking him back to their quarters was a risky option as it presented the danger of someone seeing him in this state of distress, but there was a divan in the far corner of his office, undoubtedly often in use during the early months of the mission. She sniffed the air, deciding that the linen and blanket had been unused for quite a time, but were fresh, so she guided her exhausted _ashayam_ to the piece of furniture and tucked him in. It took mere minutes for him to fall into a deep, dreamless sleep.

=/\=

_Dear Charles Tucker jr,_

_As your son is too emotionally impacted by the contrary nature of your two latest communications, I have decided to take it upon myself to provide an answer to your latest letter, not least because I consider continued loss of contact between my mate and his family an unacceptable situation. _

_It would be easy for me to claim that Vulcans cannot experience offense or hurt, but it would be a lie. We experience those emotions even more acutely than humans do and therefore we need to avoid expressing them, lest they overwhelm and cripple us. Since it is obvious that your first communication was not written with a clear mind, I find it illogical to hold that against you, especially as I have also very recent experience with losing a close family member and therefore vividly remember the irrational thoughts that grief brings to one's mind. In that regard I offer my forgiveness for the words you used to describe me and my presence in the life of your son. _

_What I find hard to forgive is the pain these words have caused to my beloved, and seeking his forgiveness is something that will not be easily achieved. It is reassuring that you have managed to seek help and overcome your obvious problems, something that I can easily relate to as your son's influence played a large part in my overcoming the untimely death of my mother, even though I did not manage to make that sufficiently clear at the time. _

_As someone who has made her fair share of erroneous decisions in regard to the development of my relationship with Trip, I can understand that you never had a conscious wish to bring harm to him, which is why I am willing to let the past be the past and 'turn the page' as the human saying puts it, but be aware that my beloved will need more time to come to the same conclusion. Until that time I hope that you and your wife will stay in good health and continue to heal from the tragedy that has befallen your family. _

_I hope that, with time, the situation will change for the better._

_With greetings to you and your wife,_

_T'Pol of Vulcan_

Satisfied with the overall tone of her communication she sent the letter into the subspace queue before looking back at her sleeping mate. The divan was not made to hold two persons, but since they had a habit of resting in close contact, the piece of furniture would do.

After shedding her uniform she carefully joined the sleeping engineer under the blanket and snuggled up to him.

=/\=

Malcolm Reed slowly navigated the corridors of the ship. Sleep had not come easily after the exciting news that Trip had brought the night before. It was still an hour before the shift began, but he was too nervous to wait in his cabin or to sit in the Mess Hall.

The introverted tactical officer was slightly bemused by Trip's unexpected psychological skills. The American had foreseen his reaction with an impressive accuracy, knowing ahead of time his reluctance to make a move on Hoshi even believing that such an action would now probably have the Captain's blessing.

"Good morning."

Malcolm was startled out of his brooding by an all-too-familiar female voice.

"Good morning, Ensign," Malcolm answered, letting a bit too much of his nervousness seep into his voice.

"I heard that we have a date tomorrow," Hoshi said shyly with an equally nervous smile.

"As I was informed by Commander Tucker."

"Are you ok with that? You don't have to..." Her tone had become slightly wary and – he noted with alarm – a little hurt.

"Oh, I am, definitely." He reassured her hurriedly on that score, slightly wary himself, but wanting above all to wipe that uncertain look from her face. "And you?"

"Malcolm," Hoshi sighed, taking his hand. He looked nervously at her slender fingers wrapped around his own; they were so small, and so easily hurt. "I know you aren't like Trip. 'Hey babe, I like ya. Wanna go on a date?'" she quipped, imitating Trip's southern twang with the sharp skills of a linguist.

The lieutenant laughed out loud, his anxiety dissolving, and Hoshi smiled in relief.

"Actually, I find it cute that T'Pol is going along with Trip in playing matchmaker," she added with her patented coy smile.

"He's right though," he admitted. "I would have said nothing for weeks, brooding about how to ask you on a date. Romance isn't my strong suit, I'm afraid." His sorry history of failed relationships bore ample testimony to that; still, he was willing to give it a try. He'd watched Hoshi from afar for so long, and to give up on this chance for happiness was more than he could bear.

"I know," she said with a smile. "That's why, as soon as T'Pol told me about the relaxed no-frat rules, I decided that if you hadn't made a move by this afternoon, I'd be standing outside your cabin tonight."

"It seems our friends are even more impatient than you are," Malcolm answered with a chuckle. He hesitated, then went on with a cautiously inviting look, "Though I certainly wouldn't mind if you felt like standing outside my cabin regardless…"

"Join me for breakfast and we'll talk about it," Hoshi offered, still smiling.

"I'd be honoured, ma'am."

=/\=

Trip and T'Pol waited at the entrance to the Mess Hall, watching Malcolm and Hoshi approach. They weren't touching – that would have been contrary to ship protocol, as well as far too public a gesture for so private a man as the tactical oficer – but their looks of warmth at each other conveyed that some kind of accord had certainly been reached.

"Hoshi, Malcolm," T'Pol greeted with a nod, noticing Malcolm's surprised look at being addressed by his first name.

"T'Pol, Trip," he returned. The barest hesitation revealed his mild discomfort at doing the same to two senior officers, even if they were all off duty.

"What's showing?" Hoshi asked, all smiles.

"Heartbreak Ridge," Trip said and made a gallant gesture for all of them to enter. A lot of already seated crewmen turned their heads and broke into smiles and chuckles about the entering foursome.

"Must be something in the air," Phlox mused, and flashed his trademark acre-wide smile.

"I'll get the popcorn," Trip said and walked off, while the others looked for four adjacent free seats.

"Do you know that movie?" Hoshi asked.

"I've never seen it before, but Trip seems to like it. Something about Marines, so I'm sure it'll have weapons in it," Malcolm explained with a grin.

"Good," Hoshi smiled and snaked her arm around his. He blinked, but let it lie; and after a moment, moved his arm so that they were both comfortable.

Trip returned just in time for the start of the show, placing a big bowl of popcorn between himself and T'Pol, giving the second one to Malcolm and Hoshi.

=/\=

About an hour later T'Pol leaned in and whispered in Trip's ear. "It appears that Hoshi and Malcolm have progressed in their courtship most expeditiously."

Trip glanced over and caught the final moments of Hoshi planting a kiss on Malcolm's cheek. The tactical officer seemed unsure of whether to simply enjoy the sensation or to protest that it was contrary to regulations, but settled for looking absurdly bashful and saying nothing.

"You do know that you were supposed to watch the movie, not Mal 'n'Hoshi, don't ya, darlin'?" Trip whispered back with an amused grin.

"We are watching an aging man with severe language assembly deficits show frequent emotional outbursts to his subordinates. He is also most cumbersome in his interaction with his desired mate. I find the interaction of Malcolm and Hoshi far more fascinating and enlightening. I still need to learn a great deal about how to... interact with a human mate."

Trying desperately not to disturb the other viewers by laughing out loud, Trip kissed the tip of her ear and whispered "You're doin'fine, darlin'. Just watch the agin'man."

=/\=

Archer walked slowly through the corridor, his mood glum.

Porthos, by contrast, trundled along with an excitedly wagging tail. Their walks after movie night were the little beagle's favorite time as the stream of returning crew members would mean that enough passers-by would stop to pet him or give him a little scratch behind the ears.

Archer had to do a double-take as he neared a T-junction. _Are that Trip and T'Pol arm in arm in public? I wonder if they'__r__e aware of it or if they do it in solidarity with Hoshi and ... wait!_

"Captain," T'Pol greeted, showing no sign of self-consciousness about the public display of affection.

"I should contact Starfleet to have _Enterprise_ be renamed _Love Boat_," he remarked with fake cheer, looking at Malcolm, who colored slightly under the scrutiny but made no move to detach Hoshi's hand from where it rested on his arm. "Somehow I knew that Hoshi and you would be the next. Congratulations."

"Do I take that as your indication of approval, sir?"

"Of course. You and Hoshi are every bit as professional as Trip and T'Pol, so I see no danger of you getting sloppy."

"We won't, sir," Hoshi promised happily.

"I'm surprised, T'Pol. Arm in arm in public?" Archer grinned teasingly, surprising himself by how easily he could fake an upbeat mood despite being reminded of his own loneliness by seeing the two couples.

"It is a traditional human gesture on a... date, and I see no reason for anyone to be offended by it. We are on a human ship," she lectured, very much in science officer mode.

"Date, huh? Well then have a nice evening," Archer laughingly replied and continued his walk. Despite his prowess at cheap acting, his mood had just gotten even gloomier.

=/\=

"Wow," Hoshi sighed in amazement as the foursome entered their hosts' quarters. "Double bed, dinner table. The Captain really went out of his way to make you comfortable. Now I know why he was grinning all day when you were on that planet."

"Indeed," T'Pol replied with an amusedly raised eyebrow, while Trip commed the galley to ask whether the diner was ready.

"How did you get Chef to make you a private dinner?" Malcolm asked.

"When Trip and I asked him about it and informed him that you and Hoshi would be attending too, he appeared to be... relieved. I believe his exact words were 'it was about damn time'."

"Seems like Chef's a hopeless romantic," Hoshi replied and grinned to herself at T'Pol's new-found habit of memorizing human phrases.

"So how did you like the movie, T'Pol?" she asked while the steward served the dinner and lit the candles.

"It was... difficult to follow," the Vulcan admitted, trying to mask the fact that those difficulties came mainly from her fascination with Hoshi and Malcolm's interaction; though unfortunately the reserved Englishman had been largely undemonstrative, probably due to the rather public nature of the occasion. "I shall revisit it in private, when I have access to your database of colorful phrases."

"Indeed," Malcolm agreed. "This Gunny Highway chap makes Trip sound like a diplomat."

"Hey, I don't sound even half as bad," Trip mock-protested, dimming the lights after the steward had left. "And besides, for the really nasty swearin', I switch to Russian anyways."

"Don't remind me," Hoshi pleaded, certain that if the subject arose T'Pol would again start pressing for a translation. And she had a suspicion that Malcolm would not approve of her knowing half of those phrases; he was easily the most old-fashioned man on the ship, and since this was their first date she wanted to make a good impression rather than put him off.

Alas, her efforts to preserve the tone of the occasion were doomed to be in vain.

"Hoshi, what does... 'pumping the neighbor's dog' mean? Maybe the Captain..."

T'Pol's innocent inquiry was interrupted by all three humans breaking into hysterical laughter. Even Malcolm joined in, though he went slightly pink with embarrassment that seemed to be more on T'Pol's behalf than his own.

Seemingly confused by the unexpected reaction she added, "I do not understand. I was merely wondering if it refers to a form of interaction that would explain Porthos' presence on board."

The next round of guffaws erupted.

"T'Pol, I doubt that anyone will ever believe you again when you claim that Vulcans do not have a sense of humour or don't make jokes," Malcolm chuckled and wiped away a few tears of laughter.

"It's only a rather colorful figure of speech, T'Pol," Hoshi said in between laughs. "And certainly not a gesture which Porthos would appreciate."

"And for the love of God, don't _ever _mention it in connection with the captain!" Malcolm added.

That sparked the next round of chortles. It was not at all clear whether T'Pol's raised eyebrow meant that she really had no clue or whether she had deliberately tried to make them laugh.

=/\=

After finishing the meal, Hoshi broached a subject that she had pondered since the encounter with Captain Archer in the corridor.

"T'Pol, I was wondering the about same as the captain. You seem remarkably relaxed about Trip taking your hand in the corridor or walking arm in arm."

"It is a logical compromise. It would not be logical or fair to force Trip to accept all Vulcan norms on public behavior. It would be equally illogical to force me to embrace all gestures which are acceptable in human society. That's why we found the logical compromise of allowing simple gestures like casual touch but keeping more intimate contact to the privacy of our quarters."

"I'd imagine it would still cause quite a stir if you were to walk arm in arm in view of any other Vulcans," Malcolm remarked.

"Well," Trip answered, nodding assent, "we wouldn't do it on Vulcan or on a Vulcan ship. That's holdin'up _my _end of the bargain."

T'Pol eyed the happy and dreamy smile on her youngest guest's features.

"You appear amused, Hoshi."

"Yeah. I just remembered our very first conversation. You thought I was imagining things and I ended up swearing at you in Vulcan. Now, four years later, we're sitting in your quarters, sipping fine wine and discussing private matters. _Enterprise_ has changed our lives quite a bit."

"Add violatin' the time-line to your list," Trip snickered. "On that other _Enterprise_, this guy ended up alone." He jerked his thumb at the ship's tactical officer.

"Not in this one, he doesn't," Hoshi purred and shot Malcolm a glance. The one she received in return confirmed her long-held theory that there was fire beneath that sometimes glacial surface, and she shifted as an anticipatory frisson shot through her.

"I agree with Hoshi's observation. My first encounter with Trip was of a very... confrontational nature, yet it did not take long before I started to discover the more agreeable aspects of his character."

"How long?" Trip asked, evidently curious.

"Until our encounter in the decon chamber after the away-mission to Rigel X."

Trip blushed and uttered, "That'll make two, then."

"Vulcans are touch-telepaths, ashayam. I was acutely aware of your fascination with my ears."

Trip plainly didn't know what to answer, but his embarrassed look was enough to cause an amused eyebrow to wander upwards on T'Pol's features. Drowning in each other's eyes, they momentarily forgot the presence of their friends.

Malcolm shot Hoshi an amazed glance. Their two friends were gazing at each other with a look that was so hot that the it was entirely possible that the ship's fire suppression systems would be triggered into responding. It was clear that not in his wildest dreams would he have thought that a Vulcan would be capable of such an unmistakable display of love.

"Didn't know I was that obvious," Trip said eventually, still seeming slightly embarrassed.

"You obviously failed to notice that I did not immediately protest your... ministrations," T'Pol answered, and Hoshi could have sworn that the corners of the Vulcan's mouth had twitched upwards for a moment.

The ensign started fanning herself with a napkin, grinning widely. "You have no idea just how hot that exchange was. I'm amazed that you can talk so easily about such intimate things."

"It wouldn't have happened if someone other than you and Malcolm were present," T'Pol explained. "I consider you, Hoshi, a very close friend, and Malcolm is one of Trip's best friends. As I understand it, it is usual to share even intimate details of one's life with good friends."

"Only a Vulcan would analyze the logic of friendship," Malcolm teased. The tinges of pink on his cheekbones suggested he wasn't entirely comfortable with this degree of exposure at such short notice, but he was coping with it manfully.

"Indeed," T'Pol shot back with an arched eyebrow. "In fact there is a _very_ intimate detail that we decided to share with you."

Hoshi and Malcolm exchanged a surprised glance, not knowing what would come next. The Brit looked distinctly apprehensive.

"What I am about to explain is not usually divulged to non-Vulcans, but since it is likely that we will spend the next several years on this ship, we wish to have at least one other person who knows our situation. Should something happen to Trip and myself, responsibility will then fall to you to decide whether or not to reveal this information to medical personnel."

"Sounds scary," Hoshi muttered nervously.

"It isn't," Trip smiled back. "Just listen."

"Trip and I do not merely pursue a romantic relationship. We are bond-mates. By human standards this is comparable to being engaged."

"Trip popped the question?" Hoshi squealed in surprise. T'Pol shot her a confused look.

"Does that mean he asked you to marry him?" Malcolm clarified.

"He did not have to. We share what is called a mating bond. It is a telepathic connection. Our bond is still forming, but, once it has reached its full strength, we will be considered married by Vulcan law."

The two guests listened in wide-eyed amazement.

"Our bond has consequences, however. If we both should be incapacitated, it is imperative that we are not separated from each other, as we will need each other's mental presence to heal. It is also important that – if possible – we be put in physical contact. A strong touch-telepathic connection will make it easier for me to reach Trip's mind."

"If your minds are connected," Malcolm asked, "does that mean you can communicate telepathically?"

"No; at least, not yet. There are ancient texts that speak of mates who could 'speak without words,' but it is an exceptionally rare occurrence. Vulcan telepathic abilities are limited."

"That would mean that Trip must have latent telepathic abilities," Hoshi mused. "I know I have, that's why I'm able to pick up languages so quickly. It's extremely rare amongst humans."

"Not necessarily. I have started to research the matter. The human brain is exceptionally adaptable. If a region of the brain is damaged, it is often possible to train other regions to adapt and take over the functions of the damaged region. That means an undamaged human brain has a considerable amount of unused capacity. It is my theory that my mind, reaching out to his, caused his brain to adapt to basic telepathy."

"Amazing." Malcolm stared contemplatively into his glass of wine. "And this bond formed just like that?"

"Usually a bond is initiated by a priest during the wedding ceremony, but ancient texts exist which describe instances of bonding without a mind-meld. They describe rare events of such bonding, if a Vulcan found 'the One'..." T'Pol trailed of and drowned in Trip's eyes again as their hands reached for each other across the table.

"They're doing it again," Malcolm mouthed to Hoshi with an amused glance. She nodded and observed the two unlikely lovebirds with rapt interest.

After a few moments the Englishman softly cleared his throat to bring them out of their hypnosis, while Hoshi contributed a mooning "aawww" to the rescue-effort.

"Didn't the priest initiate a bond when you married that Koss bloke?" was the next question, when the two lovers had returned to the here-and-now.

"He tried. Although the bond between Trip and myself was in a very early stage then, it still was powerful enough to prevent a union between me and Koss. I did not understand why I experienced extreme repulsion during the ceremony at the time, but I do now: It was our bond defending itself against intrusion."

"So whenever Trip gets fancy ideas about another woman, the bond will smack him round the head?" The gray eyes twinkled in a way that would have severely startled the Armory staff.

"A somewhat crude but accurate description, Malcolm."

"Hey, I don't need no bond to stay faithful," Trip chuckled in mock-indignation.

"Given your proficiency in _interspecies-relationships_ before we bonded, it is reassuring to know that there is a safeguard," T'Pol pointed out with obvious amusement, provoking even more laughter.

Their conversation was cut short by the blaring com-device on the wall.

"Senior officers, report to the bridge! Senior officers, report to the bridge!"


	6. Heat

**05 Heat**

Even though a late night call for senior officers to appear on the bridge was indicative of a serious situation, T'Pol found her mind occupied with thoughts about her mate. Their new status as a committed pair was barely three days old and she already found herself in the middle of a family crisis. Knowing what it meant to lose all close family members, a prolonged absence of contact between Trip and his next of kin was not an acceptable option for her.

Much more worrying, however, was the seeming ease with which he had shrugged off the emotional stress of the night before. Nothing during the evening they had spent with Hoshi and Malcolm hinted at the distress he had been in over the conflicting communications from his father. It was obvious that he had experience with fighting down emotional distress swiftly. That was a desirable talent for a Vulcan, but not exactly conductive to good health in a human. She would have to keep a close eye on his emotional situation, she decided, as she would not wish him to descend into the same dark persona he had threatened to become in the Expanse, when he could barely deal with the death of his sister. Unfortunately, keeping a close eye on him would be quite difficult at the moment, as he was the only one of the day's participants who was not currently on the way to the Bridge. His place was down in Engineering.

A hurried plea to stay safe had been all she was able to give before her beloved sped off towards his post.

=/\=

As the turbo-lift door hissed open, the four senior officers ran onto the Bridge and relieved their counterparts of the 'graveyard shift'.

"Sorry to wreck your evening." Archer apologized as a formality; such a summons was normal in an emergency situation. "We've picked up an automated distress call from a Vulcan ship."

"Did they identify themselves?" T'Pol asked, her interest firmly drawn to the situation at hand when she learned of the vessel's origin.

"The name is _T'Planit_," Hoshi explained, listening to the recording. In response to the captain's questioning look – an implicit request for more information – she went on, "It's an ambassadorial courier – the personal transport of Ambassador Soval." Her face hid her shock only poorly.

"How long to the rendezvous?"

"Two hours at warp five point two, Sir," Ensign Mayweather answered.

"Another ship is approaching them," T'Pol interrupted. "They are ahead of us bearing 246 mark 25."

"They're traveling at warp 4.8 and at our current speed will beat us to it by 10 minutes," the helm officer added, and T'Pol felt an uncomfortable premonition. She knew that the engines were currently not in excellent shape.

"Whose is it?"

"Unidentified. The power signature is close to that of a _Kumari_-class battle cruiser, but not identical," the science officer reported, typing away at her console somewhat more frantically than usual. Normally she would strive to hide her inner turmoil, but she calculated that a measured expression of her consternation might spur her human colleagues into a more swift reaction to the crisis.

"Too risky," Archer decided, and opened a channel to Engineering. "Archer to Engineering. Trip, can we get more out of the engines? We've apparently entered a race, and as long as we don't know who our opponents are, we've gotta be there before them."

"5.3, maybe 5.4 for a while, but we'll be redecoratin' Engineerin' in the worst way in the process. We haven't completed all the redesigns yet. And we'll probably be out of spares afterward."

"Damn!"

"We'll take care of it," Trip answered, and T'Pol had to fight the urge to contradict him publicly. He had admitted himself that exceeding warp five point two could have potentially serious consequences. It appeared that the abstract concept that humans called 'fate' had thrown her the most dreaded challenge imaginable.

The ship was in a dangerous situation that required her mate to risk his health and perhaps his life, and despite her fear she had to stay professional. Steadily she forced her fear into submission and returned to the calm state of mind that was necessary to deal with the crisis.

=/\=

"Anna, take the automatic routines offline and control the intermix-ratio manually, keep it 0.3 below recommendation. That'll relieve the pressure on the EPS grid a bit," Trip barked as he ran out of his office into main engineering. "Rostov, purge the manifolds!"

"What's wrong?" Anna Hess asked as she raced over to the console.

"We're gonna red-line the engines and it'll soon be a hellhole in here," Trip answered, frantically checking all his readouts. "Tucker to bridge – Cap'n, we're ready down here! Start 'er at five point three. I'll get back to ya if we're ready for five-four!"

=/\=

"Ok, give it a shot Cap'n," came Trip's report over the com, about 20 minutes later.

"Travis, warp 5.4."

"We should pass them in 5 minutes," the helmsman reported.

"Hold her steady, Ensign. Trip, how's the status in engineering?"

"Engineerin's... oh for Pete's sake!..." Trip's swearing was interrupted by the muffled sound of a small explosion and an audible thud, which sounded to the anxiously listening Bridge officers very much like what one would expect if a Commander hit the deck. Another furious Russian blue-streak sounded over the com, which made Hoshi gasp and blush deeply. Still, disconcerting as the flow of invective might be to the ship's communications officer, it was reassuring in that if Trip was able to produce it, he was still alive and well – at least for the present.

The same might not be the case for the engines, however.

Captain Archer knew that they were in trouble.

=/\=

T'Pol watched Hoshi's reaction. Considering Ensign Sato's radical change in facial coloring, it could only mean that her mate's latest venture into foreign language outbursts contained an even stronger message than illicitely mating with someone else's mother. It did not sound as though he had paid much attention to her request to be careful.

"'Everything OK' would sound a whole lot better," she heard the captain sigh; and she wholeheartedly, if silently, shared his assessment of their situation. "Keep the channel open, Hoshi, just in case Commander Tucker's..."

A sudden bawled communication cut through the order, making it redundant. "Cap'n, I'm evacuatin' all non-critical personnel from Engineerin'! We've got 60 degrees centigrade down here. It's a damn hell-hole. I can hold it for another two minutes or so, any longer and we're gonna have to get out and _push_'er home."

"Ok, Trip, hold it for two minutes, then we go back to five point one."

"Sure like the sound 'o that..."

"T'Pol, where's the other ship?"

"We passed them zero point five-five minutes ago. At Warp five point one, we would reach the _T'Planit _four point five minutes before them."

"Ok,Travis, five point one, give Trip a break."

"Aye..."

"EVERYBODY GET DOWN! IT'S GONNA BE NASTY!" Trip's shouting sounded through the still open connection to Engineering. A series of explosions were followed by an almighty thud, sounding very suspiciously like someone violently slamming into a bulkhead. The connection went silent and only hissing sounds – probably coolant leaks – remained.

"Archer to Engineering!"

The captain's request was met by silence, only the hissing of those leaks could be heard. Her keen hearing could make out several muffled voices in the background – among them Lieutenant Hess' – but unnervingly, Trip's was not among them.

"Archer to Engineering!" The captain's voice was louder, with a note of panic in it.

"Engineering, Hess here. We have casualties, we can sustain five point one, nothing more. Engineering is a mess," a very heavily-breathing Lieutenant reported.

"We'll send help," Archer offered. "T'Pol, Malcolm, go down, see if you can help, alert Phlox."

"Aye, Sir."

He did not have to give that command twice. T'Pol flipped open her communicator to summon Phlox en route to Engineering.

=/\=

"Oh, bloody Hell!" Malcolm uttered, when he followed T'Pol into Engineering. The air was scorching hot. "T'Pol, over there!"

They found the unconscious and bloodied body of Commander Tucker sprawled beside a bulkhead, and she reached for his neck to check for a pulse. She found one, but she reported it to be weak and unsteady. "T'Pol to Phlox, medical emergency in Engineering."

He was privately amazed by how steady her voice sounded, considering the fact that her heart must be pounding even more frantically than his own.

"I'm already on my way," Phlox replied with the calm of a man who had seen such a situation thousands of times. Only his heavy breathing bore witness to the fact that he was indeed already rushing to the scene of the accident.

"Commander, I'll check for other casualties, maybe you can keep an eye on Trip," Malcolm suggested, and he took T'Pol's answer in the form of a grateful glance and a nod, responding with a nod of his own. What a difference an evening could make, he reflected. Just twenty-four hours ago she would never have allowed him such a private insight into her emotional state. Pushing his wandering thoughts aside, he jogged off to find the other victims of the explosion.

"Two more injured, but they can walk. Looks like Trip took the brunt of it," the Armory officer reported just two minutes later, when the medics and Dr. Phlox arrived.

"No spinal injuries," he heard Phlox summarize. "Load him on the stretcher and off to sickbay. Where are the other casualties?"

Malcolm pointed towards the back of engineering where Anna Hess was administering emergency first aid to injured crew members.

=/\=

Lt. Reed and Commander T'Pol filed into the ready room to give Captain Archer an update on the situation as soon as they were in possession of the facts.

"T'Pol, what's the status?" the captain asked as soon as the officers were in front of his desk.

"Commander Tucker, Lt. Rostov and Ensign McInally are in Sickbay. Severe damage to the EPS grid, but Lt. Hess is convinced it is repairable. A life support team is working on returning the temperature in Engineering to normal levels as quickly as possible."

"Understood. Well, if we can hold our current speed we'll reach the _T'Planit _in about 30 minutes. Lt. Reed, assemble a team of MACOs to accompany T'Pol to the ship when we get there."

"Aye, sir," Reed nodded and left at once.

"How's Trip?" he asked, once the door had closed behind the tactical officer.

"Phlox says he is stable," T'Pol answered tersely. "We should concentrate on planning the rescue-mission."

"Of course," Archer nodded, his expression preoccupied but not unsympathetic. "We can't dock, just in case this mysterious ship is hostile and we need to fight, so you'll have to go in a shuttlepod. We've got about four minutes before those guys arrive. I don't think that'll be enough."

"There is one option," T'Pol answered. "We could use an inertial start for the shuttlepod."

"How does that work?"

"We will spool up the shuttlepod's engines and open the launch bay doors at full impulse. The inertial dampers need to be deactivated locally. Once the doors are open _Enterprise _comes to an emergency full-stop from maximum impulse speed. The inertial energy will catapult the shuttle out of the bay. That will give us more speed than possible on our own propulsion for at least 30 seconds."

The captain frowned. "Sounds dangerous. We only had a single test with Trip's locally-disabled inertial dampers. Not to mention that we don't really want to know what happens if a small meteorite crosses our path while the launch bay door is open."

"It is dangerous, but it is the only chance to dock with the _T'Planit _in under four minutes."

"Have you done something like that before?"

"No, but my theoretical calculations have shown the risks to be manageable."

He sighed. "I'd start to argue with you, but we don't have the time and you've proven me wrong often enough, so I'll trust your instincts."

"Thank you, Captain," she said and turned to leave.

"Commander," he called out, before she reached the door. "Be careful,"

"Always, Captain," she answered and Archer couldn't help smiling despite the grim situation.

=/\=

Sergeant Amanda Cole and her MACOs were lined up, waiting for her arrival when T'Pol entered the launch bay.

"Ten_-hut!"_ Amanda ordered.

"At ease," the Vulcan returned and addressed the soldiers, her voice as level and impersonal as she could make it.

"The transfer to the target will be fairly unpleasant – the human term would be 'a wild ride' as we will have to reroute power from the inertial dampers to the engines. The dampers will therefore work at reduced power and efficiency. It is imperative that you all strap in firmly as soon as we board the shuttle. Once we are aboard the Vulcan ship, I expect my directions to be followed to the letter."She paused infinitesimally before issuing the order.

"Board the shuttle."

"Ten-hut, right-face!"

T'Pol watched the MACOs move in an orderly, almost choreographed manner in response to the barked command. Her fondness for structure and order admired this, but she also wondered if this was an instance of what Commander Tucker liked to call 'showing off' on behalf of the MACOs.

As soon as the shuttle's hatch was closed, the launch bay was depressurized and the doors were opened, despite _Enterprise _still being at full impulse-speed. The motionless _T'Planit _was visible directly ahead with the unknown enemy, also having dropped out of warp somewhere about four minutes behind them.

"Shuttlepod Two tobridge, we are ready to start."

"Acknowledged. Start in thirty seconds."

=/\=

The countdown was nearing completion. Amanda Cole was startled slightly when she heard the Vulcan in the pilot seat mutter, "Here we go."

She couldn't follow up that thought as suddenly her breath was taken away by a massive acceleration. A hideous screeching sound filled her ears as the shuttle slid across the launch bay floor and was hurled out of the door, leaving two smoking trails behind. Amanda fought down a snort. It was the first shuttle launch from the revised shuttle bay. Instead of being lowered by a robotic arm, shuttles were now supposed to start on own propulsion through a forward-facing door. Well, if the sound track had been anything to go by, they new launch bay was in for the first repair. Her thoughts were soon drawn to their flight, however.

She became increasingly worried as it appeared more likely every second that the Commander would smash them head-on into the stranded Vulcan ship. At what looked like the last possible moment, however, the pilot forced the shuttle into a steep dive and then a steep ascent as they dove below the Vulcan transport. Once the obstacle was cleared, the passengers' stomachs were field-tested again as the shuttle was yanked into a looping roll, ending with them facing the opposite direction to that from which they came, with _T'Planit's _docking port almost straight ahead.

Spooling down the engines, Commander T'Pol coasted the last part of the distance and they docked with a hefty _clunk_.

"_Enterprise_, we have docked," she reported, just over two minutes after being catapulted out of thelaunch bay.

=/\=

"Jesus Christ!" Travis exclaimed, his eyes like saucers as he watched the science officer's shuttle-acrobatics. "I'm not sure that was within the shuttles legal parameters."

"The other ship is approaching," Malcolm reported tensely, wishing – not for the first time – that regulations allowed a tactical officer to ready the ship for attack on his own initiative rather than waiting for the order to do so. "They're charging weapons."

"Full power to hull plating," Archer barked before being thrown to the floor as a phase cannon hit rocked the ship.

The order was obeyed instantly, but still it was too late to prevent damage – which Reed reported dutifully, trying to keep the bite of frustration out of his tone. "Full hit to phase cannons, one offline."

"Torpedoes, full yield!"

"Their shields are down." Malcolm analyzed the display as the screen showed two of the Mark II photonic torpedoes smash into the attacker, which looked like a Kumari-class cruiser of the Andorian Imperial Guard. Thankfully he had still memorized some of the coordinates Shran had given them during the fight with the faux Kumari several weeks ago – the one that later turned out to be a drone ship.

Another hit rocked _Enterprise, _and he reported – though naturally not in those exact words – that both cannons were now very expensive paperweights. All he now had left to use were the phase cannons, and although he was willing to use them if he had to it was likely that a direct hit would destroy the enemy altogether – a result that would probably not go down well with the Imperial Guard. Whatever explanation the Andorians were about to come up with, though, they'd better make it a spectacularly good one.

"We could ram them," Travis offered.

"What?" Archer looked at him in disbelief, and Malcolm wasn't deeply impressed by the implications either.

"With Shuttlepod One, the way we launched Commander T'Pol," the helmsman clarified, seeming to have survived the incredulous glares of his two senior officers present. "One launch bay floor is ruined already and with the fried engine we have to tun back anyway."

"Aw, what the hell?" Archer grumbled. "Depressurize Launch Bay 1, prepare to open doors. Travis, bring us up behind them."

Travis performed the same L4-maneuver that they'd used once to get rid of Duras, and positioned the ship directly behind the attacker.

"Open doors, full emergency stop in 10 seconds!"

When _Enterprise _came to a sudden halt, the crew looked on as the uncontrolled shuttle hurtled towards the Andorians and exploded as it smashed into their propulsion section, setting off a bigger, secondary explosion.

"They're dead in the water, sir," Malcolm reported with the tiniest of smug smiles. If there was something that he loved almost as much as he did love the ship's communications officer, it was winning a fight.

=/\=

Wordlessly, T'Pol directed the MACOs along the corridors. Even for her disciplined emotional control, the picture looked grim. Vulcan corpses littered each room they had entered so far. The walls were scarred from the fire-fight that had ensued with whoever was responsible for the massacre. Two critically injured survivors had been found so far and transported to _Enterprise's _sickbay.

As they entered the meditation chamber, her control lapsed for a second and she gasped audibly.

_Soval!_

=/\=

"Hoshi, get me the Vulcan High Council. I'll take in my ready room."

"Aye, sir."

A couple of minutes passed while the transmission was set up. Jon fidgeted with a couple of data disks and resisted the urge to take a swig of coffee.

Abruptly the logo on his computer monitor gave way to the image of the First Minister of Vulcan.

"It is agreeable to see you again, Captain Archer." T'Pau opened with a nod.

"Nice to see you, too, Minister. I wish the circumstances were less negative than they are."

"I was informed that you have found Ambassador Soval's ship."

"Yes, it was boarded and most of the crew was murdered. We have rescued 3 survivors, all in critical condition."

She leaned forward, obviously deeply concerned. "Is Ambassador Soval among the survivors?"

"He is. My science officer says he is in a healing trance and asks me to inform you that we need a Vulcan healer as soon as possible."

"A healer is on his way. We have been in contact with the Andorian government. The Andorians who attacked the ship are rogues – criminals. Commander Shran of the Imperial Guard has been dispatched to render any assistance required, and he also is bringing a healer with him."

"I see."The captain suppressed a faint sigh at the thought of Shran's abrasive personality in a potentially volatile situation, but there was no denying that the presence of a second ship in support would be comforting, and there was no doubting the Andorian's courage. In the meantime, we'll try to do what we can for the survivors. Do you have any information that could be helpful for us?"

"I could not give you any more information than your Commander T'Pol already possesses. Is she not available?" T'Pau looked mildly surprised.

"She is, thank you Minister."

"Peace and long life, Captain Archer."

"Live long and prosper, Minister T'Pau."

The connection closed, and the Starfleet logo winked back onto the screen.

Sighing heavily, the Captain sat back in his chair for a while. Why did his ship stumble into each and every crisis in the quadrant?

=/\=

"Ah, Commander." Phlox greeted T'Pol in a low voice when she entered the darkened sickbay,

"How are they?" she asked.

He studied her carefully before he replied, judging what he could safely tell her that would not add further to the strain she was under. The dark rings under her eyes were a manifestation of her exhaustion.

"The Ambassador is still in his healing trance, but his vital signs are starting to stabilize, although on a very low level. Unfortunately Commander Tucker does not seem to be reacting well to my therapy. He has only marginally improved. I'm sorry that I do not have better news for you."

"No need to apologize, Doctor. I am here to offer my help. Once the crisis is over, I shall give you all the information you'll need, but for the moment it is important that I achieve a position where I can be in close contact with Commander Tucker."

"So the rumors are true that you and Mr. Tucker are – as the humans say – an item, finally?" Phlox asked, unable to hide his wide smile despite the dire situation.

"We are considerably more than that," T'Pol replied with a stern look. "Once I'm in sufficient contact, you will notice that Commander Tucker's vital signs will fall to an even lower level, but they will stabilize and gradually improve."

"You want to put Commander Tucker into the same healing trance as Ambassador Soval?"

"Yes. He cannot initiate it on his own, but I can assist him. Once the healer arrives, he or she will know how to proceed."

"You are a bonded pair!" he stated, with more pleasure and less surprise than his visitor would most likely have expected.

"How do you know?" Her delicate eyebrows rose. She was plainly disconcerted, and somewhat uncomfortable with this development.

"During my years in the IME I have worked for long periods on Vulcan. It would appear that I have gained the trust of your people to be given such delicate information. That, I must say, opens a lot of new therapeutic options."

"Indeed."He watched resolution replace indecision on the Vulcan's face; now that the situation was out in the open and accepted, it could be dealt with in a matter-of-fact manner. "How is the physical constitution of Commander Tucker? The biobeds are fairly narrow; I would have to position myself on top of him."

The doctor smiled. "You are delicately built. Your weight will not cause him any problem."

"I see."

"I'm relieving you of duty, for medical reasons, of course. It's of paramount importance that the chief engineer's recovery is promoted in any way possible. Please go ahead. I will put the privacy screens in place."

"Thank you doctor."

After being assured that their privacy was secure, she removed the blanket and looked at the pale figure of her mate. He was clad in only his blue skivvies. Most of his wounds were covered with patches and bandages; he saw that she suppressed a wince at seeing how many of them there were. She removed her uniform and carefully laid herself down on him. Not knowing if she would ever get the chance again while he was still alive, she kissed his neck gently, despite her inherent aversion against such a public display of affection. She initiated the trance by putting her hand on the psi points on his face to initiate the necessary touch-telepathic contact. Their _katras_ would immediately begin their joint work of healing him – a concept that had always fascinated the doctor, and which he would dearly have liked to be able to study.

He drew the privacy curtain and left them to it. He had received a letter from Doctor Lucas some while ago and never gotten around to finishing it. Now seemed as good an opportunity as any to catch up on his neglected correspondence, particularly as the good doctor had drawn his attention to a very interesting microbial reaction that seemed likely to repay further study.

_What is it that I wanted to do? There is something I forgot, _he thought an hour after the two Commanders had initiated their healing trance. _You're getting old, Phlox. _Checking his monitor he noticed that the vital signs of Commander Tucker had started to improve. Smiling to himself, he returned to his microscope to continue his analysis.

=/\=

Captain Archer walked through the corridors, but his mind was elsewhere.

Ever since he had seen his four senior officers happily chatting on a double-date, he had felt even worse. Although he was genuinely happy for the two couples and had given his stamp of approval without hesitation, their very happiness hammered the fact home that he was alone. Never had the saying 'it's lonely at the top' been more spot-on than right now.

His mind wandered back to the climbing tour with Erika and the almost forgotten but unbelievably glorious sensation of waking up with a female body in his arms. ONCE – just once in over four years he had not woken up alone. But Erika was now on _Columbia_, married to Starfleet, just as he was. A divorce had never looked like such a good prospect before. Captaining a ship had been a life-long dream, but the older he got, the more acute the realisation became that the price of the privilege was a very high one – a very lonely life indeed.

The doubts about continuing his service on a starship had been with him ever since the end of the Xindi mission. Erika had almost eradicated them on their tour, but only almost; and now they were growing back, bigger and deeper by the day. Too bad that sleeping with the woman he loved was great, but no cure for the scars his soul had sustained over the last four years.

Still brooding, he absentmindedly entered sickbay, trundled over to Trip's biobed – and froze. _How dare they shove it in my face like that, _his mind screamed, and a poisonous but wholly involuntary tidal wave of sadness and irrational envy raced through his mind. The ship's half-naked chief engineer was in his biobed with the first officer in her underwear lying on top of him, both closely entangled, her lips pressed to his neck and her right hand's fingers resting on his face in a way that almost reminded him of the peculiar face grab of Minister T'Pau, before she had mind melded with him back in the Forge on Vulcan.

"What the _hell?_"

=/\=

Phlox, who had not noticed the captain's arrival, was abruptly roused from his analysis by the sound of the growled question from behind the privacy screen. In a surprisingly swift movement, considering his robust build, the doctor grabbed the startled captain and dragged him away from the bed before hurriedly closing the privacy screens again.

Captain Archer's usually pleasant face was suffused with anger. "Doc, what exactly is going on in there?"

"That is none of your business," the usually light-hearted Denobulan shot back, his own anger rising in response. "How can a man of your experience fail the simple task of grasping the concept of a privacy screen?"

Obviously ignoring his question, the captain showed no sign of backing down; if anything, his fury intensified. "I gave them permission to have a relationship. That _doesn't _include permission for T'Pol to come to sickbay and snuggle up to her boyfriend every night. This is a medical facility, not a cheap motel!"

Phlox drew a deep breath to give himself time to control his reply, but it still fell far short of his usual respect. "Considering that you are stumped by something as simple as a privacy screen, I wouldn't expect you to be able to tell a Vulcan healing trance from an intimate encounter," he ground out. "Commander T'Pol has been relieved of duty and will remain so until the arrival of the Vulcan healer, on _my _authority, which in this department takes priority over yours. And now, Captain, kindly leave my sickbay or I'll have to declare this a quarantined area to enforce your departure!"

=/\=

The captain was initially taken aback. Not many people in his life had ever had the nerve to call him an idiot to his face, and certainly never on his own ship. The most mortifying thing was, though, that Phlox was right. He had jumped to a stupid conclusion, due to his frustrated mindset and an irrational surge of envy. He felt a flush of shame replace the pallor of rage on his face.

Wordlessly he turned to leave, but stopped again, not wanting to leave this conflict hanging between himself and the ship's doctor. His shoulders slumped.

"I'm sorry, Phlox, I was out of line."

Compassion replaced the anger on the Denobulan's features. He nodded. "You were, but your reaction is understandable. Maybe it would help if you sat down for a moment?"

Nodding in his turn, the Captain took a seat.

Phlox sat down opposite him. From his expression it was clear that he intended to pursue a conversation which even now he had no idea would produce sensations of extreme embarrassment. "Captain, if you remember, we had a discussion here three years ago. There was a period of sexual tension between you and your first officer. It was understandable. Vulcans and Humans exhibit identical sexual signaling characteristics, and by those standards T'Pol is an extremely attractive woman. Humans, males especially, are not designed to endure long periods of time without sexual intercourse. So these tensions are unavoidable. Your professionalism and your discipline allowed you to endure it without acting on any urges."

Jon was uneasy and – inevitably – uncomfortable, but he hoped Phlox would soon get to the point. The news about T'Pol's physical attributes was no news at all; when she'd first come on board it had all he'd been able to do to address his conversation anywhere above her collarbones. Fortunately, her facial expression had attracted his attention, and as soon as he'd realized that it was still one of disdainful condescension that had made ignoring her more obvious charms a heck of a lot easier.

Next moment, however, he wished that the doctor had stayed on the generalities of human male sexual frustration.

Those blue eyes saw far too much. Phlox leaned forward and spoke gently.

"But that is not your first and foremost problem, is it?"

The captain released a shuddering sigh, and stared through Sickbay's wall for a moment, gathering his thoughts. Perhaps it would do him good to have a confidant, and the ship's MO would certainly keep his secrets confidential; certainly he needed to release some of the emotion that had been boiling up inside him for the past few weeks. He was horrified by how little it had taken to finally snap his own professionalism when confronted by what had seemed unprofessional behavior by his officers. Where had his trust in their integrity gone? He should have known better. But just in that one second of blinding rage and jealousy, he'd lost it. Now he could feel the cracks starting to creep through his confidence in his own ability to function as a ship's captain. His crew deserved the best, and once, in the early days when his own confidence had been boundless (in hindsight he sometimes sadly thought of it as 'overweening') he'd felt up to the job. If he was going to start behaving like this, he no longer deserved to sit in the captain's chair at all.

"No, Phlox. In those early days of our mission, somewhere around the start of our second year, I think I developed a bit of a crush on T'Pol. Maybe it's still lingering somewhere back there." He sighed again and pointed at his temple. "Seeing them like that..."

"That may well be, although I doubt that. It would explain some of the envy you most likely felt, when seeing Commanders Tucker and T'Pol in an intimate situation. I believe, however, you are experiencing something much more taxing: loneliness."

Jon just nodded with a frustrated scowl. It wasn't the easiest talk he ever had, but somehow it was good to talk with _someone. _And Phlox would never give anyone absolution out of a sense of misguided friendship; in his own way, the Denobulan's professionalism in the service of the ship was as absolute as his own. _More so, actually, the way you just acted, _his conscience sneered.

"Commander Tucker was once your best friend, but he turned to T'Pol for help, while you secluded yourself." He held up a hand, seeing the captain's incipient protest. "You had your reasons, captain, and everybody on board knew what they were. You were bearing a burden that was all but unbearable, and you coped with it as best you knew how. Nevertheless, for whatever reasons, a gulf opened up that never fully healed.

"And unlike the Commander, you have no family. As your doctor and, I hope, your friend, I can give you only one piece of advice. Remove the reason for your current predicament before it grows into a depression. I would say you are not very far from it now."

Jon studied his linked hands. "I know, Phlox. I've been pondering to resign from Starfleet for a while now."

"Why should you resign? After more than four years of faithful service, Starfleet would be extremely ungrateful if they would deny you a year or two of hiatus. Or maybe you could take a post at Starfleet Command?"

The captain stared into the empty room and didn't answer immediately. When he spoke again his voice was sad and resigned, echoing the hollowness inside him.

"You're right Phlox. Please don't speak with anyone of the crew, I want to tell them myself."

"What has been said here stays here, you know that. But please promise me something. If you have symptoms like today again, report back to sickbay."

"What symptoms?"

Phlox looked at him with the familiar fatherly compassion, mingled with the determination to make the situation clear. "Did you deliberately violate the privacy of your senior officers?"

"No, I didn't even plan on coming to sickbay. It just happened, somehow," Jon admitted with embarrassment.

"That's what I'm talking about. Although you're not as close as you once were, Commander Tucker is still your friend. You feel isolated and you start to get depressed, so you sought out the presence of a friend, even if he's unconscious. And when you discover that that friend is, so to speak, 'already spoken for', you react with rage out of all proportion to the offense. That in itself, Captain, speaks volumes about your mental state.

"I'll give you this mild anti-depressant," he explained and the captain felt the cold nozzle of a hypospray on his neck. "I think we should set up a daily consultation. It doesn't have to be long, but I would like to monitor your psychological condition."

"We'll do that, thanks Phlox."He mustered a faintly shamefaced smile. "Hope you're not angry anymore."

"I never was. If I had just ushered you away, we wouldn't have had that discussion. You would have left and your problem would have continued."Suddenly that unnerving Denobulan grin split the doctor's features. "I had to be a bit... creative to get you to open up. It was a spontaneous decision, but you will surely agree that it is preferable to having to summon you here when it is already too late."

"You're one helluva doc, Phlox."

"You're welcome.

"And now, Captain, if you would permit me, I am in the middle of some extremely interesting work in my laboratory, so unless you need me for anything further…?"

Jon gave a choke of laughter. Phlox's carefully timed irreverence was almost as good as the contents of that hypo. At least now he was spared the task of relieving the ship's commanding officer from office – for now.

"Okay, I'll leave you to the important stuff. I'll just get back to the dull old day job of running the ship."

The doctor beamed. "I believe the human expression is, 'Someone's got to do it.'"

=/\=

"Doc?"

Malcolm and Hoshi walked into sickbay in the early morning.

"Ah, Lieutenant, Ensign. What can I do for you?"

"We couldn't find Commander T'Pol and when Lieutenant Reed did a scan, he found her here," Hoshi answered rather anxiously. "Two days ago Trip and T'Pol told us of their... connection and that it might be necessary to put her in close contact with him to help him heal. When we saw that exactly that had been done, it got us worried about how serious Commander Tucker's condition is."

"They told you that they're bonded?" Phlox looked surprised.

"Yes, Doctor. Probably not every minute detail, but quite a lot. So how does it look? Their biosigns were awfully weak," Malcolm added. He coloured slightly as he spoke; it was not, strictly speaking, the preserve of the tactical officer to monitor the physical state of his superior officers. A considerable amount of leeway could be allowed in private and off-duty, but both he and Hoshi were about to report to the Bridge and as such were in uniform.

"They must trust you a great deal to give you that much information."

"We're friends, Doctor. They actually gave us permission to inform you should anything happen to them, but you seem to know it already."

"I do. Don't worry, Mr. Reed. The biosigns are so weak because she has initiated a healing trance. In fact, Commander T'Pol is making excellent progress. She is expending a lot of energy, but if the recuperation continues as it is, they'll be both awake by the evening."

"Can we see them?" Hoshi asked.

"Considering that they trust you so much, you can, but be cautioned, their posture may look somewhat... intimate."

"Trust me Doctor, even those two just looking at each other can be utterly intimate," Hoshi answered with a smile as Phlox showed them where their biobed was.

=/\=

Hoshi quickly grabbed the blanket and put it over their friends' sparsely clothed figures, wondering why Phlox hadn't done that. At a guess, however, he hadn't thought that visitors would be trooping in to intrude on the pair's privacy.

"Even when they're out of it you can see just how bad they've got it for each other," she whispered, her eyes damp with emotion.

"Yes, would you ever have though that a Vulcan would be so romantic as to put herself in trance while kissing her mate's neck?" Malcolm took Hoshi's hand as they watched them in their peaceful slumber. That they were looking at two superior officers was completely irrelevant. They both had agreed that the night before had felt like the start of a wonderful friendship, and both of them were united in their relief over Phlox's positive prognosis.

=/\=

Hoshi and Malcolm greeted the Captain formally as they entered the Bridge.

Shortly after having taken the comm console, Hoshi turned towards her commanding officer. "We're being hailed, sir. It's Commander Shran."

The captain straightened in his chair, his expression one of mingled pleasure and wariness. "On screen."

Shran appeared on the viewscreen. He looked tired and tense, and his normal look of friendly challenge towards Captain Archer was missing. "I see you've done half my job already, pink-skin."

It was obvious that the captain sensed instantly that there was something wrong with his old sparring partner, but his tone remained friendly and even. "Always eager to help, Shran. Good to see you again."

There was no pleasantry in response. "Are some of your own people on that ship?"

Even for the bellicose Andorian, this was pushing it. _Enterprise_'s CO paused slightly before he replied, as though to emphasise the fact that he had the choice as to whether to or not. His voice, when he did so, was noticeably cooler. "A detachment of MACOs; we boarded and apprehended them. Minister T'Pau told us that Andoria considers them criminals."

"They are. Get your people out and tell me when you have them," Shran said grimly.


End file.
